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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



THE ANTHEM 
ANGELIC 



AND 

©tber Sermons 



BY 



Rev. William Henry Bancroft 

Author of " Shining Pathways " 



* 



Printed by 
GEORGE W. JACOBS & CO. 

PHILADELPHIA 



'LIBRARY of 30NGRESS 

I" wo Ooptes rteceiveii 

MAY 22 iy05 
///OQ3 



.B343/U 



Copyright, 1905, by 
William Henry Bancroft. 



Foreword 

A shower of sparks; a rush of wind; a burst of 
flame ; and a beloved church building was totally de- 
stroyed, that building having stood for many years. 

This book is sent forth to aid my flock in putting 
up a new sheepfold. It has been prepared as a labor 
of love. 

The book takes its title from the first sermon 
within it. The opening notes are from the song of 
the angels at the birth of Christ; its closing notes are 
from the song of Redemption in praise of the glori- 
fied Christ. 

The sermons herein have been left just as they 
were delivered to the congregation of Buckingham 
Presbyterian Church, of Berlin, Md., the edifice of 
that congregation now a heap of ashes. It was 
thought best to print the sermons in their original 
form. May they do good among many to whom the 
author is a stranger! 

With that prayer in the heart of him who spoke 
these sermons, they are launched from the press upon 
the sea of publicity. Take passage, my friend, upon 
any one of these sermonic ships and let it carry you 
to God. 

William Henry Bancroft. 



To My Wife, 

Margaret, 

Whose encouragement made this book possible, 

AND 

to the dear friends of buckingham church, 
This volume is affectionately dedicated. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

I. The Anthem Angelic I 

II. For the New Year 15 

III. The Loftiest Name 28 

IV. Beyond the Reach of Fire 40 

V. In Charge of the Angels 53 

VI. The Mission of the Small 66 

VII. The Kicking Jeshurun 79 

VIII. The Triumphs of Christianity 92 

IX. The Fowls of the Air 106 

X. Green Pastures 1 19 

XL Circles 132 

XII. Riddles Musically Interpreted 143 

XIII. Christianity vs. Worldliness 155 

XIV. The Father of the Rain 168 

XV. The Six Seraphic Wings 180 

XVI. Words Fitly Spoken 192 

XVII. Do Not Fret 205 

XVIII. The Serpent's Subtlety 218 

XIX. The Frost 230 

XX. Spiritual Compulsion 242 

XXI. Nine Tenths 255 

XXII. The Lifted Christ 268 

XXIII. Strength for the Day 280 

XXIV. The Angel upon the Stone 293 

XXV. Heavenly Recognition 305 

XXVI. A Glimpse of Heaven 318 



The Anthem Angelic 

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the 
heavenly host praising God. Luke 2 : 13. 

Within the vestibule of this Christmas sermon of 
mine, I wish you to note that the angels of heaven 
have had two great holidays. The first holiday was 
at the laying of the foundations of the world, the om- 
nipotence of God setting the rocks in order, when 
those angels winged their way to the scene of that 
wondrous achievement and let fall upon the rising 
temple of humanity a chorus of song. Their second 
holiday was at the birth of Christ, when they dropped 
a sublime anthem from their lips beneath the stars of 
Bethlehem. They are to have a third holiday, when 
they shall accompany the Lord in the clouds in the 
majesty of His second coming to earth, a seraphic 
courier announcing that mighty event with a trumpet- 
blast that shall startle the living and wake the dead. 

But we are concerned this Christmas morn with 
the second angelic holiday. Over the world-cradle 
in which the infant God was rocked the inhabitants 
of heaven wove a canopy of song, threading it with 
the grandest notes that ever passed along the air of 
earth. I ask you to study with me to-day that an- 
them angelic, and with no thought of weariness, if 
the study should be prolonged. 



2 THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 

I. I remark, that anthem angelic was a joyous 
anthem. It was rendered by a numerous company of 
celestial inhabitants. The text calls that augmented 
choir of angelic choristers "a multitude of the heav- 
enly host." The idea in the Greek is that they were 
representative of the immense army of the Lord. 
I suppose that nearly all heaven came forth that night 
to sing the earth's first Christmas carol. What wings 
cleft the shadowed air ! Wings in groups ! Wings 
in crowds! Wings in battalions! Wings in regi- 
ments ! Legions of wings ! Those wings so brilliant 
that they outshone the stars; the splendor of those 
wings blinding the stars with a darkness that did not 
lift, until those wings had flashed back through the 
gates of pearl and were folded reverently before 
heaven's highest throne. 

For what did that multiple choir come to earth? 
Was it to sound a dirge ? Oh, no ! Nothing funereal 
in the music that parted the lips of those celestial 
hosts. The leader of those choristers had just an- 
nounced to the wondering shepherds of the Bethle- 
hem hills the thrilling message, "Behold, I bring you 
good tidings of great joy." Whether that seraphic 
messenger voiced his proclamation melodiously or 
not, I do not know. But I do know that the procla- 
mation was unanimously sustained by a burst of 
music that flowed from shining tongues and lips. 
"And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude 
of the heavenly host praising God." 

You have seen the picture, "St. Cecelia at the Or- 



THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 3 

gan." Down upon the keys of the instrument, those 
keys pressed by the fairest of fingers, bright-winged 
cherubs are dropping roses. With the harmony that 
ripples from beneath those gentle fingers is mingled 
the sweetness of heavenly gardens, those roses gath- 
ered from some clustered sunrise. But the chant 
that broke from those lips angelic that first Christ- 
mas night was fragrance itself. Upon the senses of 
the Bethlehem shepherds came pouring down the per- 
fume of joy. There were roses of joy, and heliotropes 
of joy, and mignonettes of joy. Those choristers 
had gathered their flowers of song from the conser- 
vatory of the King's palace. Joy! Music abloom 
with joy ! 

Away with the idea that religion is a groan ! It is 
a song of joy. Those who present religion, either 
by words or conduct, as a form clad in midnight 
robes, and showing a face upon which shadows rest, 
give you a caricature, not a real picture. A true 
child of God does not go through the world with a 
frown upon the brow, and with features that have 
been distorted by acid fingers. A sour disposition is 
not born of piety, but of the devil. My study of the 
Bible has brought to me the knowledge that the re- 
ligion of Jesus Christ is the gladdest, the brightest 
and the sweetest thing that ever came to this world. 
Ask Peter ; and he will answer you with fallen prison 
fetters and an opened prison door. Ask Paul and 
Silas; and they will answer you with a duet at 
twelve o'clock at night under the roof of a noisome 



4 THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 

Philippian jail. Ask Paul again ; and he will answer 
you with good cheer upon the deck of a storm-driven 
ship in the Mediterranean. Ask Paul again; and he 
will answer you with a smile within Neronic dungeon 
walls. There are thousands of witnesses. Interro- 
gate them every one. They will all answer you with 
words of gold set with rubies and amethysts and 
pearls and diamonds. Religion is a host of angels 
shaking joy from their wings, and scattering 
joy from their lips over a world of pain and 
sin. Let religion have full sway within the soul, and 
it will hush all discord with heavenly harmonies. 

The trouble with many Christians is that they have 
never taken a full course in the university of God's 
grace. They have only partially studied the melo- 
dies of the Christian life. They have learned only a 
few chords, preferring the "rag-time" music of 
earth. Once come to the realization of the fact of 
pardoned sin and help divine in trouble and the sure 
prospect of heaven through the righteousness of 
Jesus Christ, and the heart will then be an organ 
from which will roll melodies accordant with the an- 
them angelic of Bethlehem's heights, that anthem 
breaking when Christ was born. Joy will press the 
keys of that organ; joy will tramp the pedals. It 
was to give joy that Christ stripped Himself of ce- 
lestial glory for the robes of earth. No wonder that 
the hosts of the army of God followed Him through 
the gates of pearl, strewing His path below earthly 
skies with the flowers of joy! 



THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 5 

II. Again, I remark, that anthem angelic was a 
hopeful anthem. Those Judean shepherds saw that 
night what no other human eyes ever saw. Astrology 
was the mother of astronomy. For hundreds of 
years had learned minds studied the heavens, and out 
of that study of signs and omens issued the glorious 
science of the stars known in this present age. But 
no Egyptian sight, no sight Persian, no sight Chal- 
dean, no sight of a Copernicus, or a Galileo, or a 
Herschel, or a Kepler, or a Proctor, or a Mitchell 
ever witnessed the splendor that blazed be- 
fore the vision of those sheep-watchers on 
the hill-top of Bethlehem. In our day, tak- 
ing a telescope as a mountain-stock, learned 
men climb from their rotating observatories among 
the Alps and the Andes and the Himalayas of stellar 
magnificence piled in the heavens of the night. But 
in all their astronomical journeys they have never 
yet found any inhabitants beyond this world, lofty as 
have been their numerous ascents, traveling upward 
through more miles than arithmetic can count. It 
was reserved for the vision of a few rustics to wit- 
ness the fact that somewhere in God's universe there 
are beings other than men. First came a flashing 
presence, filling them with fear, and a tuneful voice ; 
then "suddenly there was with the angel a multitude 
of the heavenly host praising God." 

Let this Christmas narration, inspired of God, 
forever settle the fact that there is a place called 
heaven. Where it is I do not know; neither do I 



6 THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 

anxiously care. Enough for me to know that it is. 
Wherever it is, it overflowed that night and flooded 
earth with its glistening grandeurs. No wonder! 
The jeweled walls of God's metropolis could not hold 
back the tide of glory that swept against them when 
Christ robed Himself in the swaddling clothes of the 
Bethlehem manger. Those angels came rushing to 
earth with the news of that royal advent. They 
voiced the tidings in song. He who had come was 
the Hope of the world. 

All through the past ages had men been looking 
forward to the advent of this Christ. Jacob told of 
His coming in dying prophecy. David sang of His 
coming in marvelous lyrics, those lyrics accompanied 
by the strains that David brushed from the strings 
of his sanctified harp. Isaiah climbed the highest 
peaks of divine vision and beheld His coming like 
that of the dawn breaking through the shadows of 
the night. Without His coming the world was with- 
out hope. The angelic choral of that first Christmas 
hour told that He had come. The birth of Christ 
brought to the world the most cheering news ever 
published. It was good news when it was learned 
that Wellington had defeated Napoleon Bonaparte at 
Waterloo. It was good news when it was known 
that the guns of Dewey, and Schley, and Shafter 
had silenced the tyranny of Spain. But these tidings 
announced Him who is yet to replace a lost Eden 
with a better Eden than the one with which the world 
started. No wonder that the angels expressed the 



THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 7 

fact with song! Their anthem was charged with 
the melody of hope. 

III. Again, I remark, that anthem angelic was an 
anthem which musically proclaimed a glorious truth. 
What was that truth? It was that a Saviour was 
born. What a theme that was for the songful lips 
of those choristers celestial! It is a Saviour that 
the world still needs, after the lapse of over nineteen 
hundred years since the occupancy of the Bethlehem 
manger by the Christ. This is a lost world. It is a 
ship loosed from its moorings of safety and astray 
upon a wide ocean of tempest and storm. It needs 
to be piloted back to God. It needs a mighty hand 
at the wheel. Hear it, O wandering earth ! One has 
come who is strong to save. Let the anthem angelic 
of long ago echo in every set of ringing chimes 
within churchly towers, in every bell of every village 
steeple, in every trumpet-blast at Christmastide, in 
every pealing organ and tinkling piano and trembling 
harp, in every song and carol of the advent season 
within every home and sanctuary. Carry the notes 
of that anthem angelic to every corner of heathenism 
on the globe, whether that benighted place be close 
to our own doorstep or far over the seas. Let it be 
everywhere known that a Saviour has come. 

I often think that too much thought is given at 
Christmas to a mythical Santa Claus, and not enough 
to the real Christ. Do not misunderstand me. I 
would not sour a single joy of childhood. I have 
no sympathy with those whose mission it is to banish 



8 THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 

all the sweets from the banqueting table of young 
life, replacing those sweets with vinegar, and mus- 
tard, and horse-radish, and cayenne pepper. I look 
back to-day and call up most pleasant memories of 
tender years, when, as a small boy, I went to sleep 
Christmas eve firmly believing that Santa Claus 
would visit my home in the night, making entrance 
and exit by way of the chimney, though wondering 
how so stout a form could possibly accommodate 
itself to the narrowness of so small an opening. But 
childhood is the paradise of the imagination. It is 
through the imagination of childhood that we pre- 
pare ourselves for the richer faith of after years. 
That I am now one strongly anchored to the reality 
of spiritual things I attribute to the fact that I once 
reveled among books that were filled with fancies, 
earth's greatest and grandest event, the putting on 
of human flesh by Him who came forth out of the 
imagination, the more will be the fruit of faith in 
God within the orchard of the matured brain. 

But I would not emphasize Santa Claus to the de- 
triment of Jesus Christ. Do not put Christ into a 
subordinate place at Christmas. Bring Him out of 
shadow into light. Too often in our Christmas cele- 
brations Christ is far in the background. Let the 
main idea of Christmas be that it is a time in com- 
memoration of the birth of a Saviour from sin. There 
is no theme that can compare with this one glorious 
theme. This is the czar of all themes. 

I notice that when the world's master-musicians 



THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 9 

wished an inspiring collection of melodies, they chose 
subjects that were religious. The harmonies of a 
Mozart, a Mendelssohn, a Haydn, a Handel, and oth- 
ers renowned in the musical world, rose to their high- 
est heaven of excellence when their rhythmic wings 
beat the air in praise of God. So when the army 
choirs of the upper world would render their finest 
chords, they gave the rendition at the hour of the 
earth's greatest and grandest event, the putting on 
of human flesh by Him who came forth out of the 
ivory palaces. The subject of their thrilling notes 
was that a Saviour was born. 

Oh, yes ! We need to make prominent the fact of 
Christ in the festivities of the Christmastide. What 
if He had never come ? This would have been a poor 
world in which to live. You and I, and millions 
more, would be at this moment traveling in dark- 
ness towards everlasting darkness — a midnight merg- 
ing into a thousand midnights piled together — solidi- 
fied gloom around as walls and above as roof, im- 
prisoning forever. 

Friend, do you know Christ as your Saviour? 
Settle that question now. His blood cleanseth from 
all sin. His righteousness the hammer that strikes 
off the fetters of sin. His wounded hand the hand 
that opens the jail of sin into the light and liberty 
of the sons of God. 

IV. Again, I remark, that anthem angelic was an 
anthem that proclaimed the divinity of Christ. Said 
the leader of that seraphic choir to the shepherds 



io THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 

on the hill, "Unto you is born a Saviour, who is 
Christ the Lord." That settles the fact of Christ's 
divinity. I care not what Socinus said, nor what 
said Schleiermacher, nor what said Strauss, and Re- 
nan, nor what any one has said in denial of this truth. 
I would believe an angel rather than any man, even 
though the brain of that man should weigh five 
pounds. This seraphic messenger declared that 
Christ was divine. His statement was reinforced by 
thousands of tongues that blossomed with song. 
"Suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of 
the heavenly host praising God." 

In the face of these shining witnesses, offering 
their choral testimony to the divine character of 
Christ, who will have the hardihood to say that the 
Babe whose birth was told to the shepherds of Beth- 
lehem was no more than the babe born last night in 
some maternity hospital? What did those angels 
praise God for, if Christ was altogether human? 

Why, this was the very Saviour for whom the 
world had long been looking — looking for Him 
through the flashing flames and curling smoke of 
numberless sacrifices; looking for Him from the 
mountain-tops of prophecy; looking for Him in the 
gardens and among the flowers of inspired rhetoric. 
Of whom did David speak in poetic phrase when he 
said, "The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my 
right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool?" 
Of whom did Isaiah speak when he said, "Unto us a 
child is born, unto us a son is given ; and the govern- 



THE ANTHEM ANGELIC n 

ment shall be upon his shoulder; and his name shall 
be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, 
The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace?" 

The fact is that Christ is spoken of on almost every 
page of the Old Testament. The brightest similes 
and the sweetest metaphors are gathered into bou- 
quets for the adornment of sentences that describe 
Him. Those who looked for Christ as a Saviour, 
looked for Him as a Saviour divine. That there 
might be no mistaking the truth of His divinity, a 
crowd of angels rushed after Him, as He passed 
through the gates of pearl, and crowned Him with 
sublime doxologies, their wonderful notes yet echoing 
in the air of the earth. "Christ the Lord," said the 
leader of those singing hosts. His announcement 
was sustained by those who accompanied him with 
their voices melodious. Nineteen hundred Christ- 
mases have added their testimony to the same glor- 
ious certainty. Christmas is in celebration of the 
birthday of God manifest in the flesh. If Christ was 
not God thus manifested, then let Christmas be struck 
off from the calendar of all Christian nations. In its 
stead let there be three hundred and sixty-five days 
for weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. A 
merely human Christ could not save this world. If 
that is all that Christ was, then all the populations 
past of the earth were lost ; so are lost all the earth's 
present populations; so will be lost all the earth's 
future populations. Sound the news among all the 
suns and planets of the universe! — a dead world! 



12 THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 

Then let Omnipotence swing that dead world out of 
its orbit and hurry it away to a grave of everlasting 
darkness. I joyously announce it to-day, and with 
unmistakable and dogmatic emphasis, "Christ the 
Lord !" Upon the truth of that announcement I am 
willing to stake all my hopes for this life and for the 
life to come. Let the bells of Christmas peal it. Let 
the organs, with full diapason, roll it. Let every 
Christian choir voice it in richest carol and anthem. 
Let holly and pine wreathe it in home and sanctuary. 
"Christ the Lord !" 

V. Once more, I remark, that anthem angelic 
was an anthem that gave honor to God. Listen to it, 
as it drops from flaming lips through the radiant air ! 
— "Glory to God in the highest I" 

Why was this outburst of praise rendered to God 
that first Christmas night ? Because the giving up of 
Christ was an act on the part of God that revealed 
as never before His wondrous love. If you will look 
closely around that manger in which the infant Jesus 
was laid, you will find somewhere near a cross. The 
fact that the announcement of Christ's birth was 
made to shepherds is more than ordinarily signifi- 
cant. Why did they only hear the sublime melody 
of that wondrous night? Why not pour that song 
upon other ears? Christ was to be universal King; 
why not proclaim Him in the palace of Herod? 
Christ was to be a Physician ; why not proclaim Him 
among those who practiced the healing art? Christ 
was to be a Teacher; why not proclaim Him in the 



THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 13 

schools? The reason why those shepherds were 
singled out to hear that music of the skies, I think, 
was that Christ was to be the Lamb of God. This 
the sole purpose of His coming to earth. He was to 
die for the sins of the world. No wonder that the 
angels of heaven flapped their wings in ecstatic flight 
to the scene of Christ's humble pilgrimage in human 
flesh, and cleft the air of Bethlehem with their an- 
them of praise to God! 

Oh, the thrilling story ! Faith in this Christ means 
the pardon of sin; means comfort for all sorrow; 
means sunshine for all gloom; means sweetness for 
all bitterness ; means harmony for all discord ; means 
life for death; means a mansion of glory in a world 
of glory. Come, let every one of us, in Our feeble 
way, but with glad, exultant hearts, take up the 
notes of that seraphic choir, singing, "Glory to God 
in the highest I" By and by, after repeated rehears- 
als, we shall be able to sing that anthem with more 
richness of tone than even the angels. Yea, we shall 
sing a new song. In the Apocalypse John gives us 
a few bars of that new song. They are these : "Thou 
hast redeemed us to God by thy blood." When we 
shall sing yonder that new song, our feet standing 
upon the shining pavements of the city, that will be 
heaven's eternal Christmas day. For Christ the 
songs of that day. For Christ the palms of that day. 
For Christ the arches of that day. Blessed be His 
glorious name forever! 

I wish you all a merry Christmas. Let it be merry 



14 THE ANTHEM ANGELIC 

with Christian joy. Let it be merry with forgiven 
sin. Let it be merry with the hope of gaining heaven. 
Looking at the manger of Christ, let us not forget to 
journey onward and take a look at Christ's Cross. 
That Cross is the mountain-peak of all human his- 
tory. That sublime height is all aglow with the light 
of God's love for a ruined world. 



For the New Year 

Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might. 
Eccles. 9: 10. 

It came last night — a new child of time. The stars 
chanted its birth-song. The silver-wrought shadows 
were the garments thrown around its infant form. 
The winds were the wings of the angels that lovingly 
flew in attendance around it. Welcome thou fifth 
babe of the Twentieth Century! Thy life shall be 
one more sparkling link in the chain that binds the 
years of earth to the eternity of heaven. Out of thy 
frost-lined cradle shall spring many a blessing for 
mankind. 

Do you ask me for a motto appropriate for the new 
year that is now upon us? I find that motto in the 
text. The life-long motto of the lamented Maltbie 
Babcock was, "Do it now." In boyhood, in youth, in 
manhood, he lived by that motto. In his ministerial 
life he had it constantly before his eyes upon his 
study desk. That motto was a condensation of the 
text — "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it 
with thy might." 

I. I remark, we should obey the injunction of the 
text because of the shortness of time. How quickly 
pass the years ! Cradles and graves lie close together. 
It is but a little step from infancy to old age. Our 



16 FOR THE NEW YEAR 

first cry and our last dying gasp soon kiss each other 
good-bye. What we do, therefore, must be done 
quickly. Boys and girls to-day at school are to- 
morrow men of business and matrons in the home. 
There are no moments that any one can afford to 
waste. The sands in the hour-glass of life are par- 
ticles of gold. Let no idler break the glass and scat- 
ter its contents. Woe to those who misuse precious 
hours and days ! "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to 
do, do it with thy might." 

Especially should we improve our time as it con- 
cerns the soul. It is well to be alert in reference to 
intellectual attainment and commercial gain. There 
is no room in this world for a sluggard. It is a world 
that fairly hums with activity. In the great hive of 
human existence is no place for drones. But let the 
interests of the immortal spirit be first considered 
and settled. Death's coach is always on the go ; and 
it always has a passenger. Its horses are never 
stabled. Its wheels are never still for long at a 
time, halting only to take on a new passenger. Its 
driver stops at no inn for refreshment. Hark! I 
hear the clatter of hoofs. I hear the grinding of 
tires among the gravel of the world's highway. I 
hear the snap of a whip. Death is hurrying on. Let 
him not call for you, my friend, and find you without 
a ticket of admission for your soul through the gates 
of pearl. Such a ticket is red. It takes its color 
from the blood of Jesus Christ. Be sure of getting 
that passport through repentance of sin and faith in 



FOR THE NEW YEAR 17 

the Saviour. Get it now. "Whatsoever thy hand 
findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no 
work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the 
grave, whither thou goest." 

Procrastination has been termed "the thief of 
time." It is far more than that. I arraign it here 
to-day before the bar of human experience, charging 
it with the murder of innumerable souls. Let me 
call up from the world of despair the witnesses. Men 
and women whelmed in the Flood, give in your tes- 
timony! "We had one hundred and twenty years 
of preparation for the awful catastrophe that over- 
took us, but we put off our safety until it was too 
late." Felix, what sayest thou ? "I waved him away 
from my governor's chair who sought my everlasting 
good, silencing his faithful voice with the words, 'Go 
thy way for this time; when I have a convenient 
season I will call for thee/ " Agrippa, what sayest 
thou? "I was almost persuaded to be a Christian, 
but I never completed the matter." What say the 
thousands of the lost in all ages ? Listen ! Like the 
sigh of the wind on a winter's night, a storm swoop- 
ing, multitudinous voices whisper their remorse from 
the depths of hell — "We neglected this great salva- 
tion, and we could not escape." 

Is it your intention, my unconverted friends, to 
join these witnesses, and add your hopeless misery 
to theirs? Be admonished to-day by a new year just 
begun that time is short. Before yonder cradled 
child of the century goes tottering to its grave you 



18 FOR THE NEW YEAR 

may be in perdition. Attend to your soul now. This 
the first business of life. "Whatsoever thy hand find- 
eth to do, do it with thy might." 

But for us Christians the time is also short. It is 
our business to grow in every grace and in the knowl- 
edge of Jesus Christ. Yet how many of God's profess- 
ed children are wasting the precious days of life. 
Where is the Bible that contains the commandments 
of their Lord ? Often is it a book that is less used than 
any other book in the home. Frequently is it nothing 
more than what is styled a "family Bible," an orna- 
ment for the parlor table, and never opened, except 
to record a birth or death, or to press between its 
ponderous lids a few flowers for preservation. How 
can a Christian expect to culture his spiritual life 
when he places but little value upon this divine Book ? 
If you have never done so before, begin this new year 
and read the Bible through. The same time given to 
it that is given to the reading of other books will en- 
able you to read it through repeatedly before the year 
is dead. 

Where are the religious papers that should be read 
by many Christians ? Such papers tell of the progress 
of God's kingdom ; they also are stored with a variety 
of devotional matter for quickening the life of the 
soul. But where are those papers ? They are on the 
shelves of the publishers, for many Christians do not 
subscribe for a religious paper. A Christian house- 
hold without a religious paper is a mill without any 
grist. What can be expected of the children of a 



FOR THE NEW YEAR 19 

home in which there is no news of the Church of 
God ? No wonder that such children turn away from 
the preaching services after having attended Sabbath- 
school or a young people's meeting, considering that 
their duty is then ended! If parents are not them- 
selves interested in spiritual things, they cannot rea- 
sonably think that their children will be interested. 
One of the saddest sights that ever comes to a pas- 
tor's eyes is that of the children of the Church turn- 
ing away from his voice in the services given to 
preaching the Gospel. 

Where are the majority of Christians on the even- 
ing of the mid-week gathering for prayer? They 
are at home in selfish ease, or at the store, or at the 
lodge, or at some place of amusement. Anywhere, 
except in God's house ! For feeble health, or in- 
firmity by reason of age, there is, of course, an ex- 
cuse for absence from the ordinances of the sanctu- 
ary. But these two things should be the only ex- 
cuse for such absence, save in exceptional cases, the 
providence of God ordering the absence. Should 
these words of mine reach that class of Christians, 
let me urge them to turn over a new leaf on this first 
day of a new year, beginning now to give vigorous 
attention to the services of the Lord. The time is 
short. No Christian can afford to misuse God-given 
time. 

At this point let me tell you something. Sometimes 
complaints are made against pastors in reference to 
their neglect of certain persons. Such complaints 



20 FOR THE NEW YEAR 

come from those who are themselves neglectful. That 
is invariably the case. It is the sheep beyond the bars 
of the pasture-ground that do the most bleating. 
Every pastor of any experience at all will confirm 
that statement. The sheep that keep themselves 
within the field of the Lord have no time to bleat. 
They are busy cropping the rich grass of that field 
beneath the eyes of the under-shepherd. 

II. Again, I remark, we should heed the injunc- 
tion of the text because of the passing of opportunity. 
Among men I find a sagacity that makes them keenly 
alive to the furthering of their earthly affairs. This 
is a very busy world. Its skies are darkened with the 
smoke of mills and factories. Its air rings with 
clanging anvil and pounding hammer and clicking 
trowel and jingling gold and silver and rustling bank- 
notes. Its roads are clattering with wagon wheels 
and hurrying feet. Its railways are thundering with 
onrushing trains. Oh, yes; it is a busy world. Go 
stand on Broadway, New York, or on Chestnut 
Street, Philadelphia, and watch the hastening throngs. 
Those two cities are types of London and Paris and 
St. Petersburg and Pekin, and a host of smaller 
towns and villages over all the earth, from the rising 
to the setting of the sun. Merchants, bankers, brok- 
ers, mechanics, all classes of men are daily busy with 
the world's traffic and commerce and labor. Every 
opportunity that presents itself for gain is eagerly 
seized and made use of to the highest advantage. It 
is only in God's business that opportunities are 



FOR THE NEW YEAR 21 

slighted and allowed to pass on. Christ once said 
that the children of this world are wiser in their gen- 
eration than the children of light. What was ap- 
plicable to His day is applicable to these twentieth 
century days. In the picture of life religion is too 
often put in the background. 

It seems to be a common impression that religion 
is something that is born asleep and never wakes up. 
I was reading not long since of an Indian preacher 
who preaches while in slumber. It is usually the 
other way about, the congregation in somnolence 
while the sermon is going on ! 

But Christianity ought to be the most thoroughly 
awake thing in all the world. There should be upon 
it the stamp of the text, "Whatsoever thy hand find- 
eth to do, do it with thy might." Religion requires 
fleetness of foot, quickness of fingers, sparkling eyes, 
acuteness of hearing, alertness of mind and heart. 
There is no reason that men should be more diligent 
in worldly things than they are in things spiritual. 
The fact is that the conditions should be reversed. 
Said Christ, "Seek first the kingdom of God." 

What is Christianity? It is not a hospital, but a 
recruiting agency for soldiers. It is not a banqueting 
hall, but a workshop. It is not a picnic, but a for- 
ward march against the powers of darkness. But 
bring back to earth a man like the Apostle Paul, and 
let him measure the average Christian conduct to- 
wards the affairs of God's kingdom. What would be 
his verdict? As to the Ephesians of his day he said, 



22 FOR THE NEW YEAR 

"Redeem the time," which means, "Buy up the op- 
portunity," so to all listless spiritual merchants now 
he would address the same stirring words, making 
them even more emphatic now than then — a very 
lightning flash of command. 

My friends, I am preaching this sermon to my own 
soul as well as to you. We all allow too many op- 
portunities for furthering the cause of God to slip 
from our grasp. We suffer ourselves to be too con- 
servative. We exercise too much deliberation. Mean- 
while, our chances for doing good are flying off, and 
soon we ourselves will be gone forever from these 
earthly scenes. Hear we not the footfalls of onward- 
moving time to-day. A new year is upon us. What 
are we going to do with it? Let the text be heeded. 
"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy 
might." 

We need especially to be aroused to a sense of the 
world's necessity for knowing the Cross of Christ. 
If the Bible be true, and to the very bottom of my 
heart I believe it true, then without the sacrifice of 
the Lamb of God applied to it this is a lost world. 
It is a wanderer in the heavens. It has swept off from 
the orbit of righteousness. It has for many cen- 
turies continued in sin, swinging farther and farther 
away from the throne of God. Beautiful world is 
it in its physical aspects. Beautiful its mornings and 
evenings, one aflame with sunrise, the other ablaze 
with sunset and agleam with stars. Beautiful its 
oceans and rivers and brooks. Beautiful its hills and 



FOR THE NEW YEAR 23 

woods and fields and orchards. Beautiful its living 
creatures, whether bird, beast or man. But spirit- 
ually it is a dead world. Sin in its palaces and hovels. 
Sin in its halls of learning and in its workshops. Sin 
in its cities and villages. Everywhere is sin. The 
only way to quicken this world out of death and send 
it hurrying back to God's heart is by means of the 
Gospel of Jesus Christ. This is the work that falls to 
the hands of every Christian. Therefore, "whatso- 
ever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might/' 

There is one mighty mode of bringing the world 
to Christ which affords opportunity to every Christ- 
ian, and yet that mode is often neglected. What is 
it? It is the systematic giving of money into God's 
treasury. You may not be able to preach ; you may 
not be able to instruct a class in the Sabbath-school ; 
there are many things that you may not be able to 
do; but here is a place for the exercise of even the 
smallest gifts. You can lay aside systematically a 
part of your income for God. It is systematic giv- 
ing that counts the most. Haphazard giving is of 
very little worth, and for the reason that it is hap- 
hazard, being dependent upon moods. Systematic 
giving develops a mood that is always at fever heat. 
With the mercury of beneficence always at that mark 
in the thermometer of every Christian life, it would 
not be long before the kingdoms of this world would 
become the kingdom of Christ. The trouble with the 
haphazard giver is that one day he is in the torrid 
zone of zeal and the next day in the frigid zone of 



24 FOR THE NEW YEAR 

apathy. The Apostle Paul's rule was, "Let every one 
of you lay by him in store, according as God hath 
prospered him." 

What the Church of God needs in these days is to 
have religion step into the bank and office and store 
and shop of the Christian and take a definite portion 
of the income, or profits, or wages for God's service. 

I call to mind a story that I have told before, but 
it will bear repetition. An artist was asked to paint 
a picture of a dead church. He did not paint a 
building in decay, its steeple leaning, its walls crumb- 
ling, its steps moss-grown, its fences tumbling down. 
Instead, he painted the interior of a handsome edi- 
fice. Frescoed its ceiling. Of stained glass its win- 
dows. Its pews richly upholstered. Its floor gor- 
geously carpeted. Its chandeliers flashing brass, 
sparkling with prisms. But up by the pulpit he 
painted a contribution box, that box inscribed with 
the words, "Foreign Missions;" and over the open- 
ing of that box he drew a spider's web. 

It was an artist's conception of a dead church. But 
is it not true? I would go further than that, how- 
ever, and paint not only that particular box covered 
with cobwebs, but every box that belongs to the treas- 
ury of God. The surest way to have continued inter- 
est in the things of the Lord that require to be done 
with all the might is to be continually giving in a 
systematic way for their support. "We are laborers 
together with God." That is a partnership of which 
to be proud. 



FOR THE NEW YEAR 25 

III. Again, I remark, we should heed the injunc- 
tion of the text because it summons us to a business 
of the greatest importance. There is no other busi- 
ness, in fact, of like importance. This is the most 
important business that can engage the powers of 
any human mind, or bring into play the nervous en- 
ergy of any human body, or bend the muscles of any 
human hands or feet. If you doubt this, then look at 
the example of Christ. Here is an example of untir- 
ing devotion to it. Into three years of public minis- 
try Christ crowded the service of a lifetime. "He 
went about doing good." How the winds of the sea 
smote His face and chilled His frame! How the 
fierce noonday sun beat upon His head! How the 
dews of the night wet His locks ! He was often hun- 
gry and thirsty. Once when pressed to take food 
His answer was, "I have meat to eat that ye know not 
of." His meat and drink was the doing of His Fath- 
er's will. We speak of His sacrifice upon the Cross ; 
but all His life was a sacrifice. The Cross was the 
final burden that was laid upon His back, breaking 
His heart. He lived and died for the world. 

So might I mention Paul, that man spending him- 
self for his Master — a man who feared not Sanhedrin, 
nor mobs, nor governor's chair, nor frowning prison 
gates, nor dangerous journeys, nor shipwreck, nor 
king's throne, nor martyrdom — a man who toiled and 
labored and endured hardness as no other man since 
his day — a man whose last mortal breath, in spite of 
persecution and suffering and tribulation, his mission 



26 FOR THE NEW YEAR 

for Christ bringing him finally under the frown of 
Nero, was a shout of triumph. 

So might I mention Paul's fellow-workers in the 
Gospel. So might I mention the names of hundreds 
of brave men and women, of whom the world was not 
worthy, who gave themselves to the high task of 
blessing the world by life and deed. Time would fail 
me to call that illustrious roll. But they surround us 
to-day in the galleries of light as a "great cloud of 
witnesses," looking down at us. With them are the 
hosts of God's winged servants, the angels of heaven. 
What kind of a spectacle are we making before these 
onlooking witnesses? 

Oh, no ! There is no other business that can rank 
with the business of the Christian in importance. 
Those who make religious things inferior to secular 
things miss the teaching of hundreds of Scripture 
passages, those passages setting forth the fact that 
the kingdom of God is of supreme interest. Chris- 
tianity is not an insurance against the fires of hell. 
Christianity is not an inscription for a tombstone. 
Christianity is not a cordial for a death-bed. Chris- 
tianity is not a dose of medicine for the hours of life, 
a nauseous necessity that must be swallowed with a 
wry face. It is the business of the soul. It is the 
greatest business this side of the gates of pearl. It 
requires earnestness. It must be done with the ut- 
most dispatch. The text is its trumpet-call. Listen 
to that reverberating blast from the lips of the in- 
spired preacher! Every succeeding year has taken 



FOR THE NEW YEAR 27 

tip its echoes. This new year repeats it with in- 
creased emphasis. Do you hear it? "Whatsoever 
thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." 

I have given three points to this sermon for the 
new year. Let me repeat them. We should dis- 
charge the obligations that rest upon us because life 
is short even at its longest length; because oppor- 
tunities do not tarry, but take wing and fly away; 
and because this business of the soul is of inesti- 
mable importance. Let the whole Church of God 
be thoroughly alive. As a part of that Church, let 
us be thus alive. 

Let also those who wholly neglect their souls 
awake from slumber. "What meanest thou, O 
sleeper? Arise, call upon thy God." Look! I see 
the old year of 1904 staggering up to the throne of 
God. Upon its back are the unforgiven sins of all 
its months, the wasted hours of its days, the broken 
resolutions of its opening moments — these to be de- 
posited for the final stroke of time along 
with all the burdens of all the preceding 
years. Hasten, friend! By the cradle of this new- 
born year of 1905 kneel, putting up for God's ears 
the prayer, "Lord, I give myself to Thee. Let this 
new year be the year of my birth into life eternal!" 



The Loftiest Name 

(communion sermon.)* 

A name which is above every name. Philippians 2 : 9. 

This morning I am the pastor of a heap of ashes. 
But that appalling fact does not weaken my ordina- 
tion vows and obligations. I am ready to preach 
Christ again, and Him crucified. No fire can burn 
out my love for Him. 

It was Paul's one ambition to exalt his Lord. What 
this man did in the service of his Master he did with 
his whole heart. Many times he termed himself the 
slave of Christ. But that word "slave" falling from 
Paul's lips or dropping from Paul's pen was all 
abloom with the flowers of rhetoric. This was not 
a man who groaned under bondage. This was not a 
man who chafed beneath shackles. This was not a 
man who unwillingly wrought at the tasks that came 
to his hands. Paul's servitude was a servitude of 
love. He went from Damascus, on the day of his 
conversion, clear to Rome, on the day of his martyr- 
dom, proudly bearing the brand-marks of Him who 
had called him as a herald of the Cross. The scars 
upon his tumbled corpse outside the gates of the 



*This sermon and the two following were preached in the Stevenson 
M. E. Church, through the kindness of the officials of that church after the 
loss by fire of the Buckingham Presbyterian Church. 



THE LOFTIEST NAME 29 

imperial city, when Nero's sword put him to death, 
were badges of honor. The world never saw a more 
devoted servant of Christ; the world shall perhaps 
never look upon his like again. For Christ he lived ; 
for Christ he died. His every breath, until respiration 
ceased from his mortal body, was charged with the 
sole purpose of publishing the name of Christ to all 
mankind. Therefore, we cannot be surprised that 
Paul here wreathes that name with glory. In the 
passion of his brain and heart he speaks of it as "a 
name which is above every name." 

On this Sabbath of Communion it is my wish that 
our thoughts should all cluster around the One who 
spread for us this table. 

Did you ever hear the story of the sculptor whose 
idea it was to carve a statue of the Christ that should 
command reverence from all beholding it ? Day after 
day he shut himself within his studio, and assidu- 
ously wrought at his artistic work. In every stroke 
of his mallet and every dig of his chisel there was 
love. Into the growing figure before him he put his 
very soul. The hour came when the statue was fin- 
ished. The sculptor took his little child first into the 
studio, and bade her look upon the creation of 
his hands. He asked, "Who is it, daughter?" The 
child stood before the figure with awe upon her face. 
She answered, "It is some great man." The sculptor 
was disappointed, for he knew that his purpose had 
failed. Again he shut himself within his studio. 
Again he wrought, his every breath a prayer. Again 



30 THE LOFTIEST NAME 

the task was finished. Once more he led the child 
into the room. "Who is it, dear?" The girl's eyes 
lighted with joy, and from her lips rang the joyous 
answer, "Suffer little children to come unto me." It 
was enough. The sculptor then knew that he was 
successful. The statue was placed on exhibition, 
and crowds of people stood reverently before it. 

So this morning I would so preach as to make 
every heart thrill at the thought of Christ. For this 
day there can be no other theme. This is the pearl 
of topics in the golden setting of the days. With 
Paul, I lift the name of Christ aloft, exclaiming, 
"A name which is above every name !" 

I. I remark, that the name of Christ is a distin- 
guished name. There are many names renowned in 
the history of the world. The annals of all the na- 
tions blossom with such names. They are the names 
of famous kings and queens and emperors, of famous 
generals, of famous musicians, of famous ora- 
tors, of famous men and women of letters. 
Not only do such names breathe their fra- 
grance from the records of the various peo- 
ples of the earth, but they have also been reared on 
high in graceful shaft, in heroic statuary, and in im- 
posing architecture. To call the roll of the world's 
illustrious dead would be a long task. Thousands of 
names are blazing to-day as stars in the firmament of 
human history. 

But the name of Christ has a resplendence that is 
all its own. All other distinguished names are but 



THE LOFTIEST NAME 31 

ragged beggars in the presence of this imperial name. 
This is "a name which is above every name." 

During the World's Fair at Chicago, in the last 
century, there was held a congress of religions. Rep- 
resentatives were there of the manifold beliefs of the 
earth. But when in the addresses made at that con- 
gress of religions Christ was placed in comparison 
with Confucius, with Brahma, with Buddha, and with 
other gods created by human wisdom and supersti- 
tious heathenism, it was a blasphemy. This globe it- 
self, with its twenty-five thousand miles of circum- 
ference, is not large enough for the building of a plat- 
form for the feet of Jesus Christ to stand beside the 
feet of other so-called divinities. There is not the 
slightest likeness between Christ and the gods of 
India, of China, of Persia, or of any other land of 
darkness. His is "a name which is above every 
name." 

This distinguished name has been handed down 
all the centuries. The fact is that this illustrious 
name was announced even before Christ was born 
into the world. Away back near the edge of time 
that name trembled upon the lips of the dying Jacob, 
the quavering accents of that prince of God giving it 
pronunciation as the hope of Israel. Isaiah speaks 
of this same Christ, in one of his rapturous moods 
exclaiming, "His name shall be called Wonderful, 
Counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, 
the Prince of Peace !" That name is the one flower 
that perfumes the whole garden of the Old Testa- 



32 THE LOFTIEST NAME 

ment, greeting the sense as you enter the gate of 
Genesis, lingering in the memory after you have 
passed out the gate of Malachi. 

Other men achieve fame while they live; this di- 
vine Man achieved fame long before He had breathed 
a single breath out of the world into which He en- 
tered. In all the earth to-day there is no other name 
that wears so many crowns. 

Some names are honored in certain departments of 
life. The name of Julius Caesar is a distinguished 
name in the martial world. The name of Demosthe- 
nes is a distinguished name in the oratorical world. 
The name of Newton is a distinguished name in the 
philosophic world. The name of Copernicus is a dis- 
tinguished name in the astronomical world. So with 
the name of Morse in the inventive world. So with 
the name of Mozart in the musical world. So with 
the name of Tennyson in the literary world. Time 
fails me to give even single instances of distinction 
among names in the varied realms of human thought 
and action. 

But look at the name of Christ ! What banners are 
inscribed with it! What orations give it emphasis! 
What wisdom enshrines it! What stars blaze it! 
What skill of hand employs it ! What melodies ripple 
it ! What poems sing it ! There is no art or science 
in which this name is without honor. It is the su- 
preme name of this present age; it will be the one 
supreme name of the ages to come ; it will be the one 
supreme name of the ceaseless ages of eternity. 



THE LOFTIEST NAME 33 

Paul's statement in the text is not a mere rhetorical 
flourish. The name of Christ was, and is, and ever 
shall be, "a name which is above every name." 

II. I remark, that the name of Christ is a powerful 
name. What do I mean by powerful ? The ocean is 
powerful. Look at it, as it hurls its breaking, foam- 
ing, writhing billows upon the beach! The force of 
the impact between those tons of water and the land 
charges the air with echoes that roll for miles around. 
You have seen the power of machinery. Look at 
the huge engines that draw heavily loaded trains over 
long journeys, climbing with those same trains be- 
hind them up the sides of mountains, those engines 
equipped with immense driving wheels that seem 
to be the very embodiment of power ! I never alight 
from a railroad train in a terminal station that I do 
not give the engine a passing glance before going 
through the gate of exit, looking at both it and the 
swarthy man whose fingers grasp the controlling 
lever, not knowing which to admire the more, the 
hard-breathing machine or its mental master. But 
what are such exhibitions of power compared with 
the dynamic force that is in the name of Jesus 
Christ? These are only physical power; the power 
in the name of Christ is moral power, that power pul- 
sating through the centuries past and exerting an in- 
fluence to-day that is world-wide; yea, a power that 
encircles eternity. This name is a mountain-peak 
that stands forth in solitary weight of mightiness. 
"A name which is above every name!" 
3 



34 THE LOFTIEST NAME 

Look at the power of this name ! There have been 
other potent names in the world ; there are still such 
names in the world. But what was a Wellington, 
or a Shakespeare, or a Plato, or a Socrates, or what 
are a Morgan and Carnegie, and hosts of others who 
bear mighty names in their varied spheres, when 
placed beside the forceful name of Jesus Christ? As 
well attempt to compare a falling dewdrop with the 
crash of a Niagara. As well attempt to compare the 
flight of an arrow with that of an onrushing comet. 
As well attempt to compare the bursting brilliance of 
a rocket with the everlasting sheen of the midnight 
constellations. The name of Christ means more and 
weighs more and shines more than all other powerful 
names put together. It is a name that has been the 
inspiration of thousands of moral victories. It is a 
name that has hallowed and blessed this sin-cursed 
world for nineteen centuries. It is a name, as Paul 
intimates in the paragraph of the text, which is yet 
to bring into subjection all the powers celestial, all 
the powers terrestial, all the powers subterranean. 
Listen to the Apostle's magnificent statement! 
"Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and 
given him a name which is above every name; that 
at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things 
in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the 
earth; and that every tongue should confess that 
Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." 
"A name which is above every name!" 

III. I remark, that the name of Christ is a charm- 



THE LOFTIEST NAME 35 

ing name. That name fell in music from the skies 
upon the ears of the Bethlehem shepherds, as they 
watched their flocks by night. That name brought 
under its spell the rugged preacher of the wilderness 
who proclaimed it on the banks of the Jordan. That 
name sent its magnetism through the hearts of the 
Galilee fishermen and called from his toll-booth Mat- 
thew, the tax-gatherer. That name touched the in- 
nermost soul of Saul of Tarsus and changed him into 
Paul the missionary. There have been thousands to 
whom that name was such a charm that they were 
willing to die for it; those hosts thrown to the teeth 
and claws of wild beasts in heathen amphitheatres, 
burnt at the stake, torn upon the rack, whipped and 
stoned, sawn asunder, of whom the world was not 
worthy, undergoing such persecution and such mar- 
tyrdom that one cannot read of without frightening 
the blood from brow and cheek. There are millions 
to-day who love that name as they love no other 
name in heaven and earth. "A name which is above 
every name !" 

Not long since I saw two of the famous generals of 
the Boer War. As their names were pronounced 
before a great throng of people, and as they came 
galloping into the arena upon their fiery steeds, there 
was displayed an enthusiasm by the assembled mul- 
titudes that was grandly thrilling, the clapping of 
thousands of hands and the huzzas of thousands of 
throats like the sound of breaking waters on the 
ocean's strand. But the name of Christ is a name 



36 THE LOFTIEST NAME 

that rouses more fervor to-day than any other name 
in all the world. Blessed name! There is more 
music in it than in multiplied orchestras. There is 
more sweetness in it than in multiplied gardens. 
There is more grandeur in it than blazes along the 
walls of autumnal forests. There is more glory 
in it than in multiplied galaxies. Put together all 
harmonies, all that is saccharine, all splendors, all 
sublimities, and they are as nothing compared with 
the charm of this bewitching name. "A name which 
is above every name!" 

Oh, the charm of that name! It has been the 
softness of many a pillow of death. It has been the 
cheer of many a sorrow. It has been the light of 
many a gloom. It has been the strength of many an 
hour of weakness. It has been the honey of many a 
disappointment. It has been the hope of many a 
despair. It has been the gain of many a loss. It has 
been the heaven of many a grave. I cannot say it in 
conversational tone ; that would be too tame. I must 
ring it out from the lowest depths of my heart. "A 
name which is above every name." 

IV. I remark, that the name of Christ is an ever- 
lasting name. There are names distinguished, names 
powerful, and names charming that glow upon the 
printed page and fall from human lips, but they are 
only historical names, or names that belong to mem- 
ory. There was a time when the name of Na- 
poleon Bonaparte was able to command thousands 
of feet to march into battle. Long after the death of 



THE LOFTIEST NAME 37 

that remarkable man the French people held his name 
in reverence. I do not know how it is now, but once 
the city of Paris was a veritable museum of Na- 
poleon's life. Everywhere the first initial of his name 
was inscribed, by day greeting the eye in solid stone, 
by night flashing forth in the fire of hundreds of 
lamps. But Napoleon's body is now only a handful 
of dust. So with the bodies of all other mighty ones 
in the records of the nations. As the centuries roll 
on, even the names of the illustrious dead dwindle 
away. Other names come forth and claim attention. 
But the name of Jesus Christ increases in worth with 
the growing old of the world. That name is more 
than historic ; it is more than a memory. That name 
is a living name. It shall endure long after yonder 
sun has been snuffed out as a candle by the fingers of 
Omnipotence and the parading stars have halted at 
their graves of unceasing darkness. 

This name has been chiseled upon the rocks of 
eternity. No vandal hand can obliterate it. No con- 
flagration can burn it. No convulsion of elements 
can throw it down. While the throne of God en- 
dures it shall endure. Everlasting name ! "A name 
which is above every name !" 

But what is the secret of it all? The answer to 
that question is the climax of my sermon. Yonder 
table holds the secret. The name of Christ is a dis- 
tinguished name, a powerful name, a charming name, 
because of sacrifice. It is the character of Christ as 
the divine Saviour that places His name above every 



38 THE LOFTIEST NAME 

other name. Christ is infinitely more than a subject 
of prophecy, infinitely more than a personage of his- 
tory, infinitely more than a martyr to truth. He is 
the Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the 
world. Had there been no Christ coming from 
heaven to earth to die for human sin, there had been 
no Old Testament Scriptures to predict Him, or 
no New Testament Scriptures to record His life and 
spell out His triumphs. Had there been no such 
Christ, there had been no Paul, no Augustine, no 
Chrysostom, no Luther, no Calvin, no Robert Hall, 
no Wesley, no Guthrie, no Spurgeon, no Moody, to 
give the Gospel eloquent voice. Had there been no 
such Christ, the world would have been left lying in 
wickedness, and you and I to-day, living in this 
glorious century of the Christian Era, would have 
been painted savages, with hearts as corrupt as hell 
itself. 

In recent days I have seen many a sight of the 
progress of Christian nations and those that have 
been influenced by Christianity; but all that I saw, 
marvelous architecture, dream-like statuary, poetic 
paintings, skilful machinery, intricate weavings, the 
wonderful products of the soil, the witchery of 
lightning for the driving of wheels and pulleys and 
the illumination of palaces of art and science, all 
were the outcome of the sacrificial name of Jesus 
Christ. In every chiseled marble, in every glowing 
canvas, in every curling wreath of steam, in every 
flying shuttle, in every rushing water, in every flash 



THE LOFTIEST NAME 39 

of electric fire, I saw that name. "A name which is 
above every name!" 

Yonder table tells the secret of that blessed name. 
This broken bread and its blushing companion, the 
fruit of the vine, take us back to Calvary.. They 
bring to view the Cross. It is the death of Jesus 
Christ that lends lustre and force and charm and en- 
durance to His name. 

O my friends, let that name be enshrined in every 
breast! Let it be the inspiration of our lives! Let 
it be the hope of our last moments on earth ! Blessed 
name! It stands for a love that has arms wide 
enough for the embracing of the globe. Be it our 
purpose to honor it ! Be it our purpose to publish it 
abroad ! Be it our purpose to serve it with undying 
loyalty! Let it be the concert key of all the music 
of our souls ! Let it be the essence of every joy and 
pleasure! Let it be the source of all light! Upon 
the pulsating scroll of the heart write it first, at the 
very highest point of our affection, so that now and 
forever it may be to us "a name which is above every 
name I" Jesus ! Saviour ! 



Beyond the Reach of Fire 

Then Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, came forth of 
the midst of the fire. Daniel 3: 26. 

There is a proverb which says, "Strike while the 
iron is hot." Then is the blacksmith's opportunity. 
Then the strength of his blows gives the metal shape 
upon the anvil. Then the sparks fly from beneath 
his ringing hammer. So is this the time for me to 
enforce useful lessons. I preach to you this morn- 
ing of those things that are beyond the reach of fire. 

The text takes us back to Babylon. Nebuchadnez- 
zar, the king, had been so lifted up with personal 
vanity as to think that he was the supreme monarch 
of the earth. It is dangerous business for a man to 
indulge in pride. Conceit often climbs so high as to 
become dizzy of brain and fall. The king caused an 
immense image of gold to be made and set up in the 
plain of Dura, in the province of Babylon. Perhaps 
it was a colossal likeness of his own form and fea- 
tures. That is not all improbable. When one be- 
comes unduly impressed with his own importance, 
he will go to any length to have that same impres- 
sion take hold of other minds. This golden image 
was to be worshipped. A decree was made and 
signed by the king that at the time of the sounding of 
the cornet, the flute, the harp, the sackbut, the psal- 



BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 41 

tery, the dulcimer, and various other instruments of 
music, the people should fall down in adoration be- 
fore the towering image. 

Yonder I see that golden image flashing in the sun- 
light. I see the waiting people assembled. I see 
the orchestra. At a given signal a burst of melody 
rends the air. The crowds prostrate themselves. 
But look! There are three men standing erect. 
Those men refuse to bow to the image. They are 
Jews, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, captives 
beneath the sceptre of Nebuchadnezzar. They are 
seized by the police and taken into the presence of the 
king. Through religious scruples those three men 
could not worship the king's image. But religious 
scruples were not regarded in those days. Nebu- 
chadnezzar flew into a rage. He commanded that 
those foreigners should be cast alive into a furnace 
of fire. So into such a furnace, heated with seven- 
fold fury, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego were 
thrown, that furnace so intensely hot that the men 
whose office it was to cast these Jews into it were 
themselves slain by the heat. 

But look ! The king is astonished beyond measure. 
He rises from his seat. He speaks excitedly to his 
courtiers, saying, "Did not we cast three men bound 
into the midst of the fire?" "True, O king." "But 
I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, 
and they have no hurt ; and the form of the fourth is 
like a son of the gods." 

Whose form was that fourth form ? It was that of 



42 BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 

an angel from heaven. Or it may have been that of 
the Christ, anticipating His incarnation in the later 
centuries. But whether it was that of an angel or 
that of Him who is more than an angel, Omnipo- 
tence was there to shield those three conscientious 
servants of God from heathen hate and anger. When 
God so wills, there is no fire, not even that of hell it- 
self, that can do harm to the least of His saints. 
With the power of Jehovah around them, those three 
men were as safe from Nebuchadnezzar's flames as 
though they were strolling through a garden of 
roses. When, at the king's command, they stepped 
out from that fiery furnace, it was found that not a 
hair of their head was singed ; that their clothes were 
not scorched; and that not even the smell of fire 
was upon them. "Then Shadrach, Meshach, and 
Abed-nego, came forth of the midst of the fire." 

There is no reason that I should dwell upon the re- 
cent calamity that visited this town. The blackened 
ruins of two churches, of nearly a score of homes, 
one of them a minister's home, and of places of busi- 
ness, all speak to-day with an eloquence that is far 
above the touch of my lips and tongue. As intimated 
at the outset of my sermon, I am to talk to you of 
those things that are beyond the reach of fire. Be it 
known to you, my friends, that there are many things 
which cannot be burned. 

I. Among these imperishable things I would place 
Christian fellowship. There was presented last Sab- 
bath morning the unusual spectacle of a Presbyterian 



BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 43 

congregation celebrating the sacrament of the Lord's 
Supper within a Methodist church. I do not know 
that such a sight was ever before seen. But to me it 
was a glorious sight. The bread served in that or- 
dinance and the fruit of the vine were sweeter to my 
taste than ever before. I am quite sure that this 
voices the sentiment of every Presbyterian who sat 
down at that Communion table through the hospi- 
tality of Christian friends. It was as if that bread 
had been mixed and baked by hands angelic, and as 
if that juice of grapes had been squeezed from vine- 
yards celestial. 

This exhibition of Christian fellowship was all the 
more striking from the fact that the hospitality of 
the day was tendered by hands that had themselves 
felt the breath of the flames. They were bandaged 
hands, having suffered loss through the destruction 
of property belonging to the church. I am not given 
much to speaking words of praise; therefore what 
I now say will have the more weight. The kindness 
of this Methodist people then shown, and still shown, 
was beautiful. Their words of invitation were like 
"apples of gold in pictures of silver." 

Do not tell me that denominational walls need be 
so high that they cannot be looked over. Many of 
such walls have been lowered for many a day, stone 
after stone removed, until now even a child can look 
over them. It is well that there should be some 
height of wall. Church unity is only a pleasant 
dream. In reference to government and modes of 



44 BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 

worship it is impossible for all minds to think ex- 
actly alike. When men do not all agree in their po- 
litical views, and when women do not all agree 
about the best manner of keeping house, it is foolish 
to expect an agreement among Christians in regard 
to many non-essential things. Let the walls remain — 
Methodist walls, Episcopalian walls, Baptist walls, 
Presbyterian walls, and all other secular walls. But 
even while such walls are standing, there can be har- 
mony concerning the doctrines of Christianity that 
are necessary to salvation. Such harmony has long 
existed. As to those things that belong to the realm 
of speculation, it is the most bigoted bigotry that 
makes discord. 

Not long since I had a remarkable dream. I need 
not give it in detail, for if I were so to do, it would 
make you laugh. Suffice it to say, I dreamed that, for 
some reason, I was in a Methodist conference for 
examination, wishing to be admitted as a member of 
the Conference. Bishop Fowler was presiding. When 
I made known to him my desire, he said to me, "So 
you now think that Calvin was wrong and Arminius 
right, do you ?" I answered in a most emphatic man- 
ner, my Presbyterian blood stirred within me, that 
I thought no such thing. But now, if that question 
should be put to me, I should be apt to say, "Those 
men are both in heaven ; I have no inclination to rake 
over the ashes of their theological controversies." 

Yes, Christian fellowship is one of the things that 
is beyond the reach of fire. In the calamity that hurt 



BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 45 

three congregations, the loss of a parsonage and the 
loss of churches that were loved by many a soul, the 
pews of those churches sacred with hundreds of pre- 
cious memories, their pulpits the place where many 
a beloved minister's voice heralded the Gospel, their 
organs the tryst of bewitching melodies, their steeples 
each a landmark, their bells solidified music that was 
often broken into calls to worship, having summoned 
successive generations, but now forever silent, there 
was that displayed which took Christian fellowship 
out of theory into fact, there crowning it with a glor- 
ious crown. Christ walked with us all in the fire. In 
religious matters there were three of us in that fur- 
nace of flames, and with the three was the Son of 
God. Christian fellowship was not then burned; it 
was strengthened. Bless the Lord! 

II. Among these imperishable things I would place 
the Word of God. Without doubt, there were some 
Bibles destroyed in the churches and in the homes 
during the fire. But there are plenty of Bibles left. 
What I speak of, however, is the Word of God itself, 
not single copies of it. This grand old Book has 
come unscathed through many a fire — through the 
fires of persecution; through the fires of infidelity; 
through the fires of heathenish prohibition. It is as 
fresh and bright and sweet to-day as when it was first 
gathered together and bound into one volume as a li- 
brary of books between two covers. Not one of its 
glowing chapters has ever been dimmed. Not one of 
its glistening paragraphs has ever been smoked. Not 



46 BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 

one of its shining verses has ever been charred. There 
is not even the smell of fire upon its lids. He whom 
this Book calls the Word of God, the expression of 
divinity, has ever thrown around the Bible the mighti- 
ness of His protection. 

After the great fire in Chicago, after the great fire 
in Baltimore, and after other great fires in other 
places, safes were opened that contained valuable 
books and parchments when the conflagration first 
broke out, and those books and parchments were 
found in good condition, having successfully passed 
through flames that were hotter than those into which 
these three Hebrew captives of the text were thrown. 
That is but a faint illustration of the preservative 
guardianship of God in reference to His Word. There 
is no fire that can burn the Word of God. As well at- 
tempt to burn the rocks of the Sierra Nevadas by 
holding against them a piece of lighted tissue paper, 
as for earth, or hell, to attempt the annihilation of 
this Book of books. The same attempts at annihila- 
tion directed towards the works of Shakespeare or 
the writings of a Plato, as have been employed to rid 
the world of the Bible, would long ago have reduced 
those works and writings to a heap of ashes. 

There have been many times when the people of 
God feared for the safety of this Book. The Bible 
declares that there was once a city called Nineveh, 
that city so large as to require a journey of three 
days to go around it, prophecy foretelling its de- 
struction by fire and water. Hundreds of infidel 



BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 47 

voices said that the statement was absurd; that no 
city of that size was ever built ; and that it would be 
impossible to destroy any place with two such antag- 
onistic elements as are fire and water. Many of 
God's saints trembled, afraid that the integrity of the 
Scriptures might be overthrown. But distinguished 
archaeologists went forth, and with pick and shovel 
those men unearthed the ancient city of Nineveh. 
Then they measured it, and, according to the old es- 
timate of a day's journey, they announced that it 
required three days to walk around it. They fur- 
ther assured the world that it was literally wiped out 
of existence by fire and water, those natural foes 
uniting in the demolition of Nineveh, a part of the 
city having been placed under water by an inundation 
of the river Tigris, another part having been swept 
by flames, finding the evidences of conflagration in 
piles of charcoal. That was Shadrach, Meshach and 
Abed-nego again unharmed in the furnace of infidel 
thought, the Son of God in the midst. 

So might I multiply illustrations of divine protec- 
tion given to this living Book. Why, if even all the 
copies of the Bible in the world to-day could be gath- 
ered together into one immense heap, and a torch be 
put to them, the modern printing press having 
turned off enough copies of the Bible to make a 
veritable mountain of books, the Word of God could 
not be destroyed. There are enough inscriptions 
from it on memorial tablets, on memorial shafts and 
monuments, on memorial tombstones, and enough 



48 BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 

quotations from it in thousands of volumes of his- 
tory and poetry and sermons, in every kind of liter- 
ature, indeed, to reconstruct it. Besides that; there 
is enough of this Book for its reproduction lodged in 
millions of memories. Let every known copy of the 
Bible be buried in a grave of ashes, and there would 
be many a saint of God to give those copies resurrec- 
tion. Yonder is a saint in trouble. Listen to him, 
as he repeats the precious promises of God's Word! 
Yonder is a Sabbath-school teacher. Listen to her, 
as she tells her class of Him who suffered on the 
Cross for human sin! Yonder is an old, spectacled 
mother grieving over her absent boy, her white hair 
a crown of silver upon her head. Listen to her, as 
she quotes to herself the covenants of God in His 
Word! Yonder is a death-chamber. Listen to 
trembling lips, as they pronounce the consolations 
of God's Word! To destroy this Book, you would 
have to destroy the world itself. No! I mistake. 
That would not destroy it. Some day in heaven 
there would be a group of the saved talking together 
about the experiences of earth. Then one would say, 
"The Bible was a pillow beneath my weary head as 
I lay tossing in a fever. Do you recall that passage 
which speaks of God as making one's bed in sick- 
ness?" Then another would say, "I was once in 
deep waters of affliction. Do you recall that passage 
about the faith of the Psalmist when all of God's 
billows had gone over him? That passage was my 
stay in that time of anxiety." So from lip to lip 



BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 49 

would flow the rich music of God's Word, the memory 
of the redeemed sending forth harmonious strains 
through the sunny air of heaven. Untold ages in 
eternity shall not dim the recollection of those saved 
by the blood of Christ. We shall need no Bible in 
heaven as a revelation; but we shall carry the treas- 
ures of the Bible forever in our hearts. 

After the battle of Richmond, a dead soldier was 
found on the field. His hand was placed upon an 
open Bible. Insects had eaten off the flesh of that 
hand, but the bony forefinger pointed to these words : 
"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow 
of death, I will fear no evil; for thou art with me; 
thy rod and thy staff they comfort me." Death itself 
has no power against this Book. 

Friend, you may have lost your home; you may 
have lost many a keepsake; you may have lost all 
that you ever owned ; but you have not lost the hope, 
the cheer, the brightness, the sweetness, the comfort 
of this blessed Volume. No fire can harm God's 
Word. 

III. Among these imperishable things I would 
place heaven. This world, after all, is a poor world 
in which to build property or make investments of 
money. I find no fault with the world in general. 
Physically it is a beautiful world. Beautiful its over- 
arching skies by day and by night, those skies the 
garden in which bloom clouds and sunrise and sun- 
set and rainbows and stars. Beautiful its mountains 
4 



50 BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 

and plains and valleys. Beautiful the sheen of its 
forests and orchards and fields. Beautiful the flash 
of its brooks, and rivers, and lakes, and oceans. 
Also socially is it largely a kind world. Men jostle 
each other on the highways of business, apparently 
caring little for each other, all pushing forward their 
own schemes or making their own plans. But let 
trouble come, and thousands of hearts are bared with 
sympathy and help. Those who sneer at the indiffer- 
ence of this world towards suffering, are owls hooting 
in the darkness. I have no use for pessimism. This 
is not altogether an unfriendly world. All of its roses 
do not have thorns. All of its paths are not rough 
with stones. All of its winds are not hurricanes. 

Yet beautiful as is this world and kind, it is a poor 
place, I say again, on which to build up all of one's 
happiness. Many of its elements have been caught 
and harnessed by man ; but those same elements often 
gain the mastery, and spread desolation and death 
in their path. A fire on the hearth in autumn days 
is a pleasant sight; that same fire curling its red 
tongue among books and pictures and furniture, and 
devouring roofs and walls, is a sight that strikes the 
bravest heart with terror. You and I need a better 
world than this for permanence of health and money 
and joy and life. Through the blood of Christ, God 
has provided such a world. 

I do not trouble myself about the locality of 
heaven. The Bible gives no lessons in celestial geog- 
raphy. Enough for me to know that somewhere in 



BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 51 

the wideness of God's universe there is such a blessed 
place. Enough also for me to know that there no 
tears shall stain the cheeks; no sighs shall part the 
lips; no sickness shall pale the brow; no sorrow 
shall hang weights upon the heart ; no disappointment 
shall cloud the mind; no shadow shall dim the sun- 
light ; no loss shall subtract from the gain ; no death 
shall take down the body. 

In that city above no calamities ever come. Never 
once in all its lustrous history has any one of its man- 
sions been even the least marred by the rude touch 
of flame or sullied by the noxious breath of smoke. 
I tell you this morning that the day hastens when this 
globe on which you and I now live shall be encircled 
by world-wide conflagration. See it! The moun- 
tains on fire ! The plains on fire ! The continents 
on fire! A sweep of fire that shall madly race over 
every sea and ocean! The fire of one hemisphere 
answering with terrible roar the fire of the other 
hemisphere ! A marriage of fire, the black hands of 
disaster lifted in the celebration of the awful nuptials, 
that wedlock of hemispheric flames not to be dis- 
solved until they shall both lie down in ashes and be 
buried in the hot cinders of a destroyed earth ! But 
heaven shall endure forever. Those who live in that 
substantial world shall walk in unsullied white; and 
Christ shall walk with them. Unbroken the life ; un- 
broken the fellowship; unbroken the happiness; un- 
broken the wealth. "Here we have no continuing 
city, but we seek one to come." Bless the Lord, we 



52 BEYOND THE REACH OF FIRE 

shall find it! "A city which hath foundations, 
whose builder and maker is God." O my unconverted 
friend, be sure to have your final citizenship with the 
redeemed of Christ! Lose heaven, and you lose all 
that is good and glorious! The loss of the soul is 
an irreparable loss ! 



In Charge of the Angels 

He shall give his angels charge over thee. Psalm 91 : 11. 

The Bible is compact sunshine, compact cheerful- 
ness, compact strength. There is no human book 
so bright, so hopeful, so invigorating. This grand old 
Book takes the tears of God's saints and fires them 
with the glory of heaven. It takes saintly sorrows 
and wreathes them with smiles. It takes even the 
heaviest burden laid upon saintly shoulders and les- 
sens its weight, removing from the load its iron, and 
replacing that iron with feathers. The thought that 
the Bible is a book of frowns and scowls is an infidel 
thought. Its peals of laughter outnumber its wails 
of distress. Its sweetness exceeds its bitterness. Its 
hallelujahs burst more frequently than its dirges. 

Those who go up into the mountains get away 
from the dust and smoke of earth and breathe re- 
freshing air. Let us climb one of the mountains of 
God's Word to-day and take in a full inspiration of 
its tonic atmosphere. Around us flutter the wings 
of celestials. "For he shall give his angels charge 
over thee." 

I. I would remark, that we have angelic guardian- 
ship in the smallest affairs of life. I open this door 
first into my subject because it is a door seldom en- 
tered. The most of us are perfectly willing to be- 



54 IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 

lieve that the angels of God are near when we are in 
sore straits, but unwilling to believe that they are 
near when the trouble is only slight. For broken 
limbs plenty of sympathy; for the scratch of a pin 
no sympathy. For a crushing, grinding, mutilating 
tribulation the stretching forth of tender hands ; for 
a headache no hands to soothe. For ruined fortunes 
words of consolation ; for the loss of a ten-cent piece 
oppressive silence. May God deliver us from such 
paralyzing infidelity! Such thoughts are born and 
bred in the darkest corner of hell. I want you to 
know, my brother, my sister, that the guardianship 
of God's angels touches even the most insignificant 
things of life. 

This very thought was in the mind of the Psalmist. 
What does he say? Listen! "For he shall give his 
angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways." 
I would place a great deal of emphasis on that word 
"all." "All thy ways." That word is not a straight 
line; it is a curving line — a circle that wraps itself 
around your life and my life. But, as if that were not 
enough to put faith into us, the Psalmist adds, "They 
shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy 
foot against a stone." There you have the perfec- 
tion of angelic guardianship. The very pebbles upon 
which we might bruise ourselves, or over which we 
might trip, shall offer no impediment to our feet — 
lifted above them by the strong, loving hands of the 
angels. Blessed Lord, what comfort is here ! 

There are no trifles in the Providence of God. Dur- 



IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 55 

ing the Spanish-American war, our Government did 
not think it belittling to place a tax upon the small- 
est articles of commerce. Neither does it belittle God 
to give the angels charge over the minutiae in the 
lives of His saints. An angel bearing a pair of hu- 
man feet above sharp stones is engaged in as divine 
a work as when he is rolling a sun along or kindling 
an aurora borealis. When I see God building the ar- 
chitecture of the everlasting hills out of grains of 
sand, or when I see Him making an Atlantic Ocean 
of drops of water, I know that there is nothing too 
small in any life to be beyond His notice. "The very 
hairs of your head are all numbered." It was God 
Himself, in the person of Jesus Christ, who said that. 

What do you call a trifle? Michael Angelo was 
once visited in his studio by a friend, the sculptor at 
work upon a statue. After a few days that friend 
paid another visit to the famous sculptor. He said 
to the artist, "Why, what have you been doing since 
I was last here?" Michael Angelo answered, "I 
have rounded a little more this muscle and given a 
little more shape to the vein of this hand." "But," 
said the friend, "these are trifles." "Not at all," an- 
swered the sculptor. "It is by such trifles that I 
make my work perfect; and perfection, sir, is no 
trifle." 

So is it the sum of our daily life that makes up our 
character. We need the grace of God as much in 
the sweeping and dusting of a room as in the teaching 
of a class in a Sabbath-school. We need that grace 



56 IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 

as much in driving a nail as in handling thousands 
of dollars in a bank,, especially if, in driving the nail, 
the hammer comes down upon the thumb ! We need 
that grace as much in mixing bread for a meal at 
home as in preparing bread for a table of Commun- 
ion. It is the common things of every-day life that go 
into life itself and make it complete — complete either 
for righteousness or unrighteousness. When religion 
becomes only the putting on of Sunday clothes, from 
Monday to Saturday hung up in closets, or laid away 
in bureau drawers, or carefully covered in bandboxes, 
it is only so much broadcloth and linen and millinery. 
What you and I need is religion that will sustain us 
as well while bending over a hot stove in the kitchen 
as while sitting in a pew within a sanctuary. The 
Psalmist, inspired of God, here offers us that kind of 
religion. "He shall give his angels charge over thee, 
to keep thee in all thy ways." 

What a thought that is! Yonder is a man amid 
the insectile vexations of business life. "Go, angel," 
commands God, "and help that man!" Yonder is a 
woman amid the multiplied annoyances of domestic 
life. "Go, angel," commands God, "and help that 
woman !" Then I see the flash of wings, those wings 
cleaving the air with more swiftness than a bolt of 
lightning. Then I see a pair of shining hands out- 
stretched to clear the brow of frowns ; to brush away 
the clouds of the mind; to quench the angry fire of 
the heart. The great question is, Do you and I al- 
ways accept such ministry? "He shall give his an- 



IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 57 

gels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways." 
II. Again, I remark, that we have angelic guard- 
ianship in our journeys. The words of the Psalmist 
so imply when he says, "They shall bear thee up in 
their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone." 
Does any one doubt the need of such guardianship ? 
There are many doors out of life. One of the doors 
most frequently opened into death is the door of ac- 
cident while traveling. How many feet might stum- 
ble, if there were no angelic hands stretched forth in 
protection along the street ! How many horses might 
run away, if there were no stronger hands than ours 
at the reins! How many steamboats might burst a 
boiler, if there were no restraining hands upon the 
safety valve! How many trains might jump the 
track, if there were no preventing hands at the 
switches or no governing hands at the throttle of the 
engine! Angels when we walk! Angels when we 
drive! Angels when we glide over the river or bay 
or ocean ! Angels when we go rushing like the wind 
along iron rails ! 

The fact that you have never seen these angelic 
guardians is no argument against their presence with 
us at such times. Neither have you ever seen heat; 
yet it warms your body and cooks your meals. 
Neither have you ever seen steam ; yet it drives your 
machinery. That which in common phrase is called 
steam is naught but vapor — the invisible spirit of 
steam kissing the air, and the contact of its lips with 
the atmosphere revealed to the eye. Neither have you 



58 IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 

ever seen light; yet it blesses the vision with 
many a picture of beauty. Neither have you 
ever seen gravitation; yet it takes the world on 
which you live in wondrous journey among the stars 
of heaven; and there is no collision, even though 
millions of other worlds are traveling through space 
at the same time. All knowledge is not dependent 
upon the sight. Elisha's servant did not see the 
horses and chariots of fire that were round about his 
master; but they were there. When God touched 
the young man's eyes, he saw them — the mountain 
full of them — the lustrous legions of the skies drawn 
up in battle array in defence of the endangered pro- 
phet. Elisha knew that they were there, knowing 
that fact through a keen spiritual sense that was bet- 
ter than outward sight. It is only blind eyes within 
that need to be helped by quickening the physical 
vision. "We walk by faith, not by sight." 

So are the angels of God with you and me when 
perils are about us. "For he shall give his angels 
charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They 
shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy 
foot against a stone." 

I ask you to note the personal element in the text 
and its surroundings. "He shall give his angels 
charge over thee, to keep thee. They shall bear thee 
up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a 
stone." That same personal element runs through 
the whole of this Psalm. This celestial guardianship 
is not only over the saints of God collectively, but 



IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 59 

also individually. You and I may appropriate the 
promises of this Psalm to ourselves, as if we were 
the only persons in existence. One is apt to feel his 
insignificance in a great crowd of people. I have so 
felt often while traveling in a well-filled railroad 
train. But looking forth from the window, the steam 
of the engine flying by has seemed to be the white 
wings of a host of angels speeding along with the 
train, their potent hands keeping the train to the 
tracks, and making the journey safe for every man 
and woman and child in every coach, all that number 
of people separated into units. It is then that I have 
whispered to myself, "He shall give his angels charge 
over thee." 

Who will say that this is naught but fancy? I 
tell you, my. friends, that this skeptical age needs a 
strong infusion of childlike faith into its veins. We 
are putting the angels of God too far away in the 
heavens, classing them with the nymphs and dryads 
of heathen mythology. We are resolving them into 
mere airy creatures that have no existence except in 
the imagination, and therefore placing them beyond 
the touch of human need. But "are they not all min- 
istering spirits sent forth to minister for them who 
shall be heirs of salvation?" Take from me the 
thought of angelic guardianship in any journey, even 
the simple one of walking across my study floor, and 
you rob me of that which is of more value than the 
jewels in the crown of a king. 

"But," says some one, "accidents often happen. 



60 IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 

How do you reconcile that fact with angelic guardi- 
anship?" Well, I answer, it is not particular what 
door of exit from this world a Christian passes 
through. If I am not tempting Providence, being in 
danger because of duty, and if it be God's good will 
to take me home through a door of accidental pain 
or accidental death, what matters it ? P. P. Bliss, the 
noted minstrel of the Gospel, singing the songs of 
Zion around the world, was taken home in the dis- 
aster of Ashtabula bridge, the train in which he 
journeyed breaking through that bridge. The pas- 
sage from that frightful disaster to the gates of pearl 
was just as swift as though P. P. Bliss had gone to 
glory from his own bed under his own rooftree. Let 
no Christian play the infidel in his thoughts about 
Providence. God's angels are always on guard. Ac- 
cidents, so-called, but change their opportunities. 

III. Again, I remark, that we have angelic guardi- 
anship in great difficulties. The troubles of life are 
not an unbroken plain. They often rise into rugged 
heights. Look yonder at the children of Israel ! Be- 
fore them the waters of the Red Sea. Beside them 
the towering hills. Behind them the pursuing army 
of Pharaoh. When Napoleon Bonaparte was told 
about the impossibility of taking his troops over the 
Alps, he said, waving his hand, "There shall be no 
Alps !" So he built the Simplon Pass, his regiments 
to march along that pass for the devastation of Italy. 
But these Israelites could not make any such boast as 
that. They were seemingly doomed to destruction. 



IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 61 

Death frowned upon them from the mountains. Death 
leered at them from the sea. Death mocked them in 
the sound of clattering hoofs and grinding chariot 
wheels behind their backs. But look! One man 
stands forth and waves a shepherd's rod over the rag- 
ing waters before that host, his long beard of white 
snowing in the wind. Behold! The waters divide. 
A shining path appears. The trembling Hebrews 
walk safely across to the other shore. Napoleon 
Bonaparte said, "There shall be no Alps!" But to 
make his word good he had to spend fifteen million 
francs and put thousands of men to many days of 
toil. God said, "There shall be no Red Sea !" and at 
His command, the tumbling waters halted, pushed 
back and reared into a crystal wall in a single night 
by hands angelic. 

The angels of that difficulty in the career of God's 
ancient people, the angels of Abraham and Jacob, the 
angels of Gethsemane around the Christ, have charge 
of you and me in every time of special need. If I 
did not believe that, I should quit the ministry. 

I like what I was reading about the faith of a 
Scotch preacher. In troublous times he and his lit- 
tle flock were climbing a mountain. Suddenly he 
saw their foes advancing upon them. "Lord!" he 
cried, "wrap around us the plaid of Thy protection." 
Then fell a mist upon the mountain, and they were 
shut out from the view of those who sought their 
lives. That mist was the drapery of God's angels. 
Just as a child hides beneath its mother's apron, so 



62 IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 

that fugitive band of Christians was hidden beneath 
the skirts of Omnipotence. 

I also like what I was reading of Martin Luther. 
He was summoned to appear before the papal council 
at Worms. His friends tried to dissuade him from 
going. He would not yield to them, saying, "I will 
go, even if there should be as many devils there as 
there are tiles upon the roofs of the houses!" That 
has the sound of mere bravado ; but it was the utter- 
ance of a man of iron faith who firmly believed in the 
guardianship of God's angels in great emergencies. 

My friends, we need to have a vivid sense of divine 
help just now as a church. Doing what we can our- 
selves, in reliance upon that help, we shall find, I 
think, that the flames which leveled yonder beloved 
structure to the ground w£re the glistening wings of 
God's angels, those wings flying abroad and swoop- 
ing that Saturday afternoon of the first of October 
to try our faith and test our spirit of self-sacrifice. 
God will not let His angels desert us now in our ex- 
tremity, if we have a trust in Him that is willing to 
work and suffer. God has placed in our hands a di- 
ploma of fire, graduating us into broader opportuni- 
ties of scholarship. Let us use these opportunities 
for our own spiritual growth and the glory of Him 
who has given His angels charge over us. 

IV. Once more, I remark, that we have angelic 
guardianship in the hour of death. We commonly 
speak of death under figures that are dark and for- 
bidding. It is high time that Christian people should 



IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 63 

banish such repulsive figures from their vocabulary. 
What business has a storm-breeding, black-winged, 
starless midnight with a sunrise ? Death is not deser- 
tion; it is multiplied companionship. If the angels 
are with us in the common things of life, if they 
travel with us, if they flock around us when we are in 
terrible difficulties, then their number is increased 
when a Christian soul is about to be liberated from its 
prison of clay. Such an hour is a preparation for 
bursting grandeur and celestial exaltation. The gates 
of the city are flung wide open. The arches have 
been sprung over the flashing highways. The or- 
chestra and the choristers are ready. The throne is 
set. All fyeaven waits for the crowning scene. Hosts 
of angels are gathered around the dying bed of the 
departing saint to escort him to a glorious triumph. 
Wings! Wings! Wings! There are wings far 
away, hastening on. There are wings fluttering in 
air around the home. There are wings folded in the 
death-chamber. God sends His angels forth and 
gives them charge of His home-coming ones, the re- 
deemed of Christ. 

Away with the least poison vine of infidelity that 
twists its serpent-like tendrils among the flowers of 
our fragrant religion! It has no right to be there. 
Away with the smell of varnish and disinfectants 
from this subject of Christian death ! Away with all 
morbid thoughts! Why close the shutters of the 
soul and shut out God's sunbeams? Why scald the 
cheeks with unceasing tears? Why chase off every 



64 IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 

smile from the lips ? Why invite all the fiends of de- 
spair to come and sit down in a house of bereave- 
ment, when we may have angels with us, some of the 
angels that came to the dying one remaining behind 
to comfort and help and bless? 

I like what I saw not long since upon a calendar 
that rests upon my study desk. The leaflet gave the 
date, and beneath the date was the inscription, "Mrs. 
Moody's Coronation Day." So also do I like what 
Luke says of Stephen who was battered out of life 
by rocks hurled from angry, murderous hands, "He 
fell asleep. ,, So also do I like what Paul said of 
himself in view of his martyrdom beneath the evil 
frown of the monster Nero, "The time of my depart- 
ure is at hand." This whole Bible is full of glowing 
figures concerning death as it comes to God's saints. 
So are the histories that record Christian experiences. 
Why, then, should you and I borrow the sombre 
rhetoric of heathenism. Why hang up Edgar Allen 
Poe's croaking raven in the home of the soul, when 
there are plenty of canaries flying abroad? Why 
give way to ungovernable grief, when there is music 
waiting to be swept from the silent strings of the 
heart ? Why not accept the tender ministry of loving 
angels ? 

Even when shall come our own hour to "depart 
and be with Christ, which is far better," the angels 
of God shall take us in charge. They bore up in 
their hands the souls of all the saints in the past ages. 
They bore up in their hands the souls of your sainted 



IN CHARGE OF THE ANGELS 65 

dead and mine. They will likewise bear us up. For 
myself, I ask nothing more in the close of life's day 
than to have loved ones near, and along with them 
the angels of God, their soft fingers filling my dying 
pillow with what the Psalmist here calls in bold, yet 
fitting imagery, "the feathers of the Lord God Al- 
mighty;" then giving their flaming coursers com- 
mand, and speeding their chariot on and up to the 
gates of pearl and the house of many mansions. An- 
gelic guardianship all the way Home ! 



The Mission of the Small 

Who hath despised the day of small things ? Zechariah 4 : 
10. 

That question was asked nearly twenty-five hun- 
dred years ago. It came from the lips of God upon 
the ears of His prophet Zechariah. Just as pertinent 
and just as momentous a question is it now as it was 
then. Hear me, therefore, while I speak to you this 
morning of The Mission of the Small. 

I. I would remark, that God has much use for 
small things. We commonly think of God in connec- 
tion with what is stupendous. We usually have no 
vision of God except as we see Him working on a 
large scale. We behold Him only as He comes 
forth to view in the parade of the stars across the 
midnight heavens, or in the kindling of an aurora 
borealis, or in the weaving of a sunrise or a sunset. 
We stand in awful amazement before Him as He 
tosses the waves of the ocean, or as He lets loose 
from His fists the winds of the tempest, or as He 
pours a Niagara over the rocks, the lightning flash 
of the waters followed by the thunder of their fall. 
We are apt to look for God altogether in those things 
that are mighty and grand and majestic and sublime. 

But I wish you to know that God does not confine 
Himself to those things which we call great. The 



THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 67 

fact is that all greatness is but an aggregation of lit- 
tleness. The storm that comes down like a deluge 
from overhanging reservoirs of cloud, flooding the 
fields and washing the streets of towns and cities, in- 
creasing the volume of mountain streams, and widen- 
ing rivers and deepening lakes and seas, is nothing 
more than a multiplication of raindrops, each one ot 
those drops akin to the sweat of a woman's brow as 
she stands over a hot stove preparing a meal. Divine 
arithmetic! The glory of an autumnal forest, that 
glory spreading itself for miles, is nothing more than 
the marriage of one lustrous color with another and 
the rearing of a numerous family of glowing leaves, 
the blush on the faces of those leaves related to the 
healthful hue of a laborer's babe asleep in its cradle. 
More divine arithmetic! The yellow corn wrapped 
up in its pale husks over the broad acres of a Kan- 
sas field, millions of grains thus wrapped up, and 
like piles of gold in a government vault, is nothing 
more than a case of geometrical progression from a 
few bushels of corn drilled into the ground in the 
early summer, those multitudinous grains bearing 
a similarity to the kernels popped into edible snow- 
flakes by a pair of lovers over a fire on a Hallowe'en. 
More of the mathematics of God! All greatness in 
the physical universe but a union of littleness. That 
is how God works. The architecture of the Rocky 
Mountains, the Sierra Nevadas, the Alps, the Hima- 
layas, all heaved and upreared and chiseled and tree- 
adorned and ice-crowned through the piling together 



68 THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 

and the massing of innumerable atoms of matter. 
God's masonry of mountain systems is but a boy's 
sand-hill in a dooryard carried higher and extended 
over a greater length. An Atlantic and a Pacific 
are but the contents of a tincup filled at a farmhouse 
pump spread out and deepened. All of God's great 
things are made from little things. 

The trouble is that we get accustomed to looking 
at God's works through a telescope. We gaze up- 
ward, and the skies above us at night seem to be an 
immense garden abloom with suns and with groups 
and clusters and constellations and galaxies ot 
worlds. Yet all the while the very small space occu- 
pied by our feet is also a garden. In a daily walk 
from his home to his office or store or shop a man's 
shoes crush multiplied wonders. I do not know but 
that the infinitude of God is more plainly in evidence 
from the eye-piece of a microscope than from the 
lens of a telescope. The truth is that no human 
brain has ever yet been able to make a final analysis 
of God's creations invisible to the naked sight. As 
the telescope reveals vastness, so also does the micro- 
scope reveal vastness. Before both of these instru- 
ments God withdraws Himself behind a veil that 
mortal fingers cannot lift. "Canst thou by search- 
ing find out God ? Canst thou find out the Almighty 
unto perfection ? It is as high as heaven ; what canst 
thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?" 
The answer to those questions is silence. God stands 
back of the upward vision of modern science with 



THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 69 

more majesty than we can endure. So behind the 
downward vision of that same science God stands 
with more greatness than we can imagine. In the 
shaping of the small, God is, to my mind, more mar- 
velous than in the building of planetary palaces and 
the rearing of sun-thrones in the heavens beyond. 

The same thing is true in the spiritual world. 
While "the chariots of God are twenty thousand, 
even thousands of angels," He often uses small 
means for the accomplishment of His purposes. Just 
as a traveler's voice has often loosened the accumu- 
lated snow of the Alps and sent an avalanche into 
the valley below with crushing force, so has 
many an insignificant instrument been the 
cause of mighty spiritual results. The child- 
ish accents of a Hebrew maid, a captive in 
Syria, directed Naaman the leper to the pro- 
phet Elisha for the healing of a frightful disease, 
Naaman's cure of body the forerunner of divine 
health within his heathen soul. A baby's tears in an 
ark of bulrushes afloat upon the Nile were the sol- 
vent that melted the chains of slavery from an op- 
pressed people and gave that people glorious liberty. 
The singing of a boy in the streets of a German 
town prepared the way for the thunder of the Refor- 
mation, the echoes of that thunder yet rumbling in 
every Protestant church service. 

Oh, yes ; God can use armies in His providence, if 
He will, but He also can just as effectively use 
worms. It seems to me that He prefers the use of 



yo THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 

what is small. Witness David's sling bringing Go- 
liath with a crash to the earth, the trained regiments 
of King Saul failing to down the boastful giant. 
Witness Shamgar's ox-goad in the slaughter of six 
hundred Philistines. Witness Samson's mowing to 
death of a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass. 
Witness Gideon putting the Midianites into disas- 
trous defeat with pitchers and lamps. Witness 
Hannah's devotion to her child Samuel making that 
child a priest in Israel whose name glistens with 
piety. Witness David the shepherd lad mounting 
the steps of a throne, the harp that he learned to play 
out in the pasture-field sending its vibrations clear to 
the end of time. Witness the widow's mite cast into 
the treasury box of the Temple outringing the gold 
and silver of the rich contributors whose offerings 
had preceded her small sum. Witness the basket 
that let Paul down along the wall of Damascus, giv- 
ing him descent into illustrious missionary career. 
Last of all, witness the Cross of Christ, a common 
instrument of execution, taking on magnetic power 
for the drawing of untold multitudes into eternal 
life. God has much use for small things. "Who hath 
despised the day of small things?" 

II. I remark, that there is among men too much of 
a disposition to disregard small things. By the time 
that one reaches forty years of life he has come to 
the realization of the importance of littleness. Suc- 
cess in any calling is the outgrowth of all that has 
gone before it. Many of the world's men of wealth 



THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 71 

look back upon poverty. They built up their for- 
tunes upon foundations of pennies. Some of the 
men whose name scratched upon a check will give 
that check honor in any reputable bank once hardly 
had the price of a loaf of bread in their trousers' 
pocket. By a careful husbandry of small sums of 
money they prepared the way for a harvest of stocks 
and bonds and shares and real estate. Where others 
wasted they saved. 

The principle that littles are the seeds of much is 
true in every department of life. Mozart came to 
skillful performance of music by spending hours in 
practicing the scales. Daniel Webster had to begin 
his training as an orator by learning the alphabet. 
The architect that designed the Congressional Li- 
brary at Washington once drew straight lines and 
curves and angles upon a slate. Michael Angelo 
spoiled many a piece of marble before he could carve 
a finished statue. 

So with every profession and every trade. Small- 
ness of effort is the herald of greatness of achieve- 
ment. If that fact could be strongly impressed upon 
young minds, it would save many a boy and girl in 
later days a mountain of trouble. Hosts of young 
people are like the prodigal of Christ's peerless par- 
able. Where he threw away the contents of his 
purse, they throw away precious moments and shin- 
ing opportunities and painstaking care, coming up 
finally against the swine-trough of failure in life. 
It is by making the most of what lies to hand that 



12 THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 

more follows. Small things first; then larger things 
afterwards. Very generally, I think, have those who 
are near the hilltop of the years learned that lesson. 
Some learn it earlier. 

But why not put that experience into the spiritual 
life ? It is here that there is a wide tendency towards 
the disparagement of little things. For example, 
many persons are careful about committing great 
sins, but lax about inconsistencies of speech and 
conduct. Some persons would no more be guilty of 
highway robbery or burglary than a rose-bush would 
attempt to grow and bloom on the top of an ice- 
berg; yet those same persons would not hesitate to 
drive a sharp bargain in trade, that bargain not able 
to look strict honesty in the face. Some Christians 
are Christians until they are the principals in a horse- 
deal! Also would some persons blush to use pro- 
fane language, but they have no blushes at the es- 
cape of a so-called "white lie" from the lips. It is 
the "little foxes that spoil the vines" of character. 
It is small sins that make large sins, if there be any 
relative size of sin. 

I advance another step, calling attention now to 
the slighting of little things in Christian work. It is 
the thought of many that only great deeds count in 
Christian work. Because they cannot speak like a 
Phillips Brooks, they will not speak at all. Because 
they cannot be a Wanamaker in the Sabbath-school, 
they will teach no class. Because they cannot be a 
Meyer or a Miller with their pen, they will keep their 



THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 73 

ink bottle corked. Because they cannot sew like a 
Dorcas, they will put no garment in a missionary 
box. Because they cannot give like a Peabody or a 
Dodge, they will let their purses remain clasped. 

It was this disregard of small things that God 
questioned in the text. Zerubbabel had started the 
rebuilding of the ruined Temple at Jerusalem. There 
were many hindrances in the way. For sixteen years 
was the work delayed. But that man of God, under 
a fresh inspiration, began the work anew. What did 
God say? "The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the 
foundations of this house; his hands shall also finish 
it. For who hath despised the day of small things?" 

It was as if the obstacles thrown up before that 
man by the enemies of the Jews had assumed gigantic 
form, rising higher, and higher, and still higher, be- 
coming a veritable mountain of difficulty. Then God 
said, "Who art thou, O great mountain? Before 
Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain: and he shall 
bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings, 
saying, Grace, grace unto it." 

God was teaching His people of those days that 
they should not despise small things. What should 
not be done then should not be done now. Let those 
with only a few talents use those few talents for the 
glory of God. God holds no one responsible for not 
being largely endowed. If God has not seen fit to 
bestow upon me the gifts of a Cuyler or a Talmage, 
that is no reason why I should refuse to preach. Be- 
sides that, it is not the possession of great resources 



74 THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 

only that tells in God's work; it is the energy of 
divine inspiration behind what one has. So God 
said to Zerubbabel, "Not by might, nor by power, 
but by my spirit, saith the Lord." 

That same lesson was taught Elijah. That rugged 
prophet had set too much store by what had taken 
place on Mt. Carmel, when the priests of Baal had 
been put to confusion by the fire that fell from heaven 
in answer to prayer. God reminded Elijah that thou- 
sands of souls had not gone after the heathen deity 
that Ahab and others worshipped. They had been 
kept from apostasy through the gentle influence of 
God's Spirit. Elijah had been looking for a general 
reformation of Israel by means of the dramatic dis- 
play on Carmel 's summit. 

Oh, this itching for great things that is character- 
istic of so many Christians! Let every one know 
that he has a part in the work of the Lord, however 
humble and obscure it may be. What if the hopper 
of a mill should refuse to hold the corn because it 
could not be the grindstones? What if those stones 
should refuse to revolve because they could not be the 
wheel turned by the race ? What if the wheel should 
hang motionless because it could not be the onrush- 
ing water? Let the stream and the wheel and the 
stones and the hopper work together in harmony; 
then the miller will have his full supply of grist. If 
you see the force of the parable, 1 apply it. "Who 
hath despised the day of small things?" 

III. I remark, that those who neglect the use of 



THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 75 

small means in God's work are guilty of sin. Some 
one says, "Now you are getting close to the con- 
science." Well, what is the sense in calling to see 
a person when you know that he is not at home? 
That is the fault of too many preachers. They are 
like the man who aimed at nothing and hit it! Pat- 
rick Henry's speech before the Assembly of the State 
of Virginia was one of the pioneers of the Revolu- 
tion. It was a stiff breeze that stirred the kindlings 
of war. A sermon that is pointless is worthless. As 
well set a hungry beggar down to an empty plate, as 
to preach without a purpose. So I say again, that 
those who neglect the use of small means in God's 
work are guilty of sin. 

"But," answers some one, "that is a sweeping 
statement. How do you prove it?" Well, I prove it 
by quoting from the very highest authority. You 
know that when there is a case of litigation in court 
the attorneys for both the plaintiff and the defen- 
dant are apt to cite the opinions of learned judges 
bearing upon the suit on hand. My source of infor- 
mation upon the point I have named is the Lord 
Jesus Christ. From His decision there can be no 
appeal. 

Well, what does Christ say about this matter? 
You will find the answer in His parable concerning 
talents. The man who had received but one talent 
did not think it worth while to make any use what- 
ever of such a trifle. I imagine that I hear him one 
day talking thus to himself: "One talent! Bah! 



76 THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 

What is that compared with my fellow-servant's 
five talents ? Or what is it even when compared with 
the two talents that my other fellow-servant has re- 
ceived? They have put their talents out at interest. 
I would do the same, if my master had left such 
sums in my care. But one talent! That is nothing. 
I will bury it out of sight." "So he went and digged 
in the earth, and hid his lord's money." 

When the employer of those men came back from 
his journey, the servant with five talents and the ser- 
vant with two talents had both doubled the money in 
their possession. The man with only one talent had 
no increase. His lord said to him, and mark well 
what he said, "Thou wicked and slothful servant." 
Christ's application is, "For unto every one that hath 
shall be given, and he shall have abundance ; but from 
him that hath not shall be taken away even that which 
he hath. And cast ye the unprofitable servant into 
outer darkness." 

Have I not established my point? What if the 
evangelist Philip had failed to preach Christ to the 
Ethiopian eunuch when the Holy Spirit told him so 
to do? Suppose he had said, "This is too small an 
opportunity. Give me a crowd of white men, and I 
will astonish the people with my eloquence. But I 
cannot go and speak to yonder negro." That would 
have been the end of Philip's evangelistic career. 
God would have had no further use for such a man. 

What if Paul and Silas had refused to answer the 
question of the Philippian jailor, thinking that the 



THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 77 

occasion was beneath them? What if Dwight L. 
Moody had heeded his pastor's advice not to open 
his mouth in public, that advice given him because he 
stammered in his talk and "murdered the Queen's 
English?" Ask that question of thousands of in- 
stances. What would be the answer? "Neglect not 
the gift that is in thee" pertains as well to small 
gifts as to large gifts. "He that is faithful in that 
which is least is faithful also in much; and he that 
is unjust in the least is unjust also in much." "Who 
hath despised the day of small things?" 

Therefore, when the Delawares and the Amazons 
of earth begin their mighty rush to the ocean as 
tiny rills; when the Andes mountains are built of 
grains of sand and rock ; when the stupendous Water- 
fall of the Yosemite valley is the leap of millions of 
drops of moisture over a precipice; when God de- 
scends with His omnipotence into the infinitesimally 
minute, even pausing in His work of directing the 
march of prodigious suns across the fields of space 
to whiten a lily's cheek, or uphold the wings of a 
sparrow in their flight, or count the hairs of a man's 
head, who will have the hardihood to despise the 
"day of small things?" 

Friend, be not guilty of that sin. Have you only a 
thimble with which to measure your ability? Fill 
it for the glory of God. Are you slow of speech? 
Do not keep silent lips because you are not fluent. 
Have you but little time to spare in the work of the 
kingdom? Make the best possible use of the time 



78 THE MISSION OF THE SMALL 

you have at command. Is your income scanty ? Out 
of it set apart whatever you can for the spread of 
Christianity over the earth. God does not hold a rule 
in His hand with which to size one's talents. He 
takes into view only the inches and feet of one's love. 
A man or woman may have only a fractional talent, 
and at the same time possess a love that covers acres. 
Do not despise "the day of small things." 

If a new church building is yet to rise above yon- 
der heap of ashes, it will assume shape and beauty, 
not from the largeness of bank-accounts in the name 
of millionaires, but from the massing together of lit- 
tle sums of money out of the willing hands of those 
who are not blessed with much of this world's goods. 
If you have only dimes or quarters or half-dollars to 
offer, lay them on top of what others have offered. 
In this crisis we want addition and multiplication, 
but no subtraction. Even do we count out division, 
except as it has to do with dividing the share of re- 
sponsibility. Give all that you can ; only let what you 
give be given freely and lovingly to God. "God 
loveth a cheerful giver." The force of that passage 
in the Greek is even more striking. The idea is that 
God loves a hilarious giver. Do not frown when you 
give; laugh; and laugh aloud. "Who hath despised 
the day of small things?" Out of such a day rose 
Zerubbabel's majestic and magnificent Temple. So 
out of such a day let rise a grander Buckingham 
Church than the one that God blew into a cinder pile 
with His breath of flame. 






The Kicking Jeshurun 

But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked. Deut. 32 : 15. 

After forty years in a preparatory school and 
forty years in college, Moses is ready to graduate. 
Upon him have come the highest honors. He is the 
valedictorian of his class. If you have ever closely 
read his farewell address to the children of Israel, 
you know that he had well earned distinction. When 
he was commissioned by the Lord to demand from 
Pharaoh the release of the Hebrews, this man mod- 
estly declined the commission, affirming that he was 
slow of speech. The duty of the day fell upon his 
brother Aaron, who was then more gifted than was 
Moses. But now Moses has outdistanced the fluent 
Aaron in eloquence. I suppose that Aaron relied too 
much upon having a pair of lips always ready for ut- 
terance, and therefore made no further advance in 
attainments. I also suppose that Moses was stimu- 
lated by his lack of flowing words into untiring ef- 
forts at improvement. How well he succeeded is 
shown in his remarkable address on his commence- 
ment day, his time having come to leave earth for 
heaven. In the fabled race between a tortoise and a 
hare, the tortoise won the race by keeping on, while 
the hare lost because it stopped now and then to doze 
along the way, in its consciousness of superior run- 



80 THE KICKING JESHURUN 

ning ability taking it for granted that any hare 
could beat a tortoise on its feet. Moses went far 
ahead of Aaron. That is a picture that has been 
drawn many times. 

Moses fills his valedictory with many figures of 
speech, the natural language of impassioned oratory. 
We are to study one of his metaphors to-day and 
learn its pregnant lessons. That metaphor forms 
the text — "But Jeshurun waxed fat and kicked." 

I. I ask you to note the ingratitude of Jeshurun. 
Jeshurun signifies supremely happy. It is used by 
Moses as a poetical name for Israel. The idea of 
kicking is taken from a pampered ox refusing to 
draw his load, lifting his hoof, and striking at his 
driver urging him on. An apt portrayal this oi 
God's ancient people. They were a people highly fa- 
vored. What blessings were let fall upon them from 
Jehovah's hands! Witness the battles that were 
fought for their liberty. Battle of the river Nile 
turned into blood. Battle of frogs and lice and flies. 
Battle of murrain and boils and hail. Battle of lo- 
custs and darkness. Battle of the death of Egypt's 
first-born sons and daughters. All of these battles 
fought for them by the Lord God Almighty. 

Witness the miracles that were wrought in their 
behalf. Miracle of the divided Red Sea, God uprear- 
ing the waters into two crystal walls, between which 
they passed in safety to the other shore ; God tumbling 
those same walls upon the heads of their pursuing 
foes, the centuries hearing the crash of those over- 



THE KICKING JESHURUN 81 

turned walls. Miracle of guiding pillar of cloud by 
day and guiding pillar of fire by night, that moving 
equipage of vapor in symbolization of the fact that 
the Lord, who never slumbers nor sleeps, is always 
in advance of His chosen ones on the journey of life, 
for God is ever in His chariot, whether we can see 
that chariot or not. Miracle of the smitten rock 
weeping water for the quenching of their thirst. Mir- 
acle of bread coming down from heaven like snow, 
their breakfast and dinner and supper every day, ex- 
cept on the Sabbath, thrown to them from the pantry 
of the skies, on the sixth day an extra supply given 
them, enough to last over until the first day. Mira- 
cles all the way to Canaan. Miracles ! 

The blessings of those people were like the sun- 
beams that kiss the hearts of shower-washed roses 
and honeysuckle, intended to call from their lips the 
fragrance of thankfulness. But instead of gratitude, 
God received from them the noxious exhalations of 
murmurs and complaints. All the while that Jeshu- 
run was waxing fat upon God's bounty, he was kick- 
ing at God's providences. His blessings made him 
act as a stubborn animal. What a sorry spectacle it 
is! The blows of Jeshurun's striking foot have 
echoed clear to the end of time. Hear those echoes ! 

But let us not be too hasty in condemning these 
people. It is often the case that we see a speck of 
dust in another's eye when we have a beam in our 
own eye. Some persons have a whole lumber yard 
in their eyes, and yet are caustically critical of the 
6 



82 THE KICKING JESHURUN 

motes that they behold in the eyes of their neighbors. 
Christ tells us that we should first clear our own 
vision before we attempt any surgical feat upon the 
optic orbs of anybody else. The fact is that these 
people of Israel have had their exact counterparts in 
every age. They have plenty of them in this magnifi- 
cent twentieth century of the Christian Era. Look 
at the blessings we enjoy! Hosts of blessings. They 
are all about us like an army encamped. For in- 
stance, between the hours of six and nine this morn- 
ing all the people of this town sat down at breakfast. 
Did everybody bow the head in thankful prayer to 
Him who thus gave their first instalment of daily 
bread on this Sabbath? I do not know. Let each 
one answer for himself. But I fancy that, if the roll 
were called, there would be many negative responses. 
Gratitude is a flower that does not naturally grow in 
the garden of the human heart ; it has to be cultivated 
at great labor and pains. 

Widen my thought. Let it take in our county, our 
state, our country, our continent, our world. How 
many Jeshuruns are kicking to-day like a spoiled 
ox? Could we know the sum contained in the an- 
swer to that query, it would appall us. The wonder 
is that God is so patient with mankind. Yet He has 
been accused of being a cruel, tyrannical taskmaster, 
ever swinging a whip in air, and lashing and cutting 
the shoulders of humanity. But the accusation is 
false. That is one of the blackest lies that ever came 
up from perdition to soil the lips of infidelity. It is 



THE KICKING JESHURUN 83 

the Jeshuruns who are at fault, not God. Waxing 
fat upon God's benevolences, their very power to 
kick is derived from the kindness and love and mercy 
of Him against whom they kick. Ingratitude is not 
a Niagara cataract belonging to only one hemisphere ; 
it is an Atlantic, a Pacific, an Indian, an Arctic, and 
an Antarctic ocean embracing a globe. Jeshurun's 
kick in the wilderness that stretched before Canaan 
was practiced long before in Eden. Jeshurun is still 
kicking. The habit of kicking is in the blood of the 
race. What a set of unthankful creatures we all are ! 
My friend, blessed with more good things than your 
arithmetic can count, more than the stars that smile 
at you from midnight skies, are you a Jeshurun ? 

II. I ask you to note the fact that prosperity often 
is a test of personal faithfulness towards God. Jesh- 
urun kicked because he had grown stout under God's 
blessings. Not only was he ungrateful for his abun- 
dant wealth, but, as the remainder of the passage 
states, "he forsook God who made him, and lightly 
esteemed the Rock of his salvation." Prosperity; 
then apostasy. What a prolific breeder is sin ! Itself 
a brat of hell, it brings forth other hell-brats of mis- 
shapen form and repulsive features. Yet there are 
those who treat sin as though it were a mere witti- 
cism — one of the jokes that Satan has cracked upon 
the ears of mankind. But the Cross of Jesus Christ 
tells all the world that human sin is the most seri- 
ously serious matter in the whole universe. It leaves 
so great a stain upon the soul that nothing less than 



84 THE KICKING JESHURUN 

the chemistry of infinite blood is able to remove the 
blot. One sin begets another sin ; and so the genera- 
tion of sin goes on. Says James, "When lust hath 
conceived, it bringeth forth sin ; and when sin is fin- 
ished, it bringeth forth death." Thus Jeshurun ad- 
vanced in wickedness, at length forsaking God. His 
prosperity was the test of faithfulness. He "waxed 
fat and kicked." 

The common impression is that adversity is the 
only thing that tries a man. Not so. God is not 
shut up to any one mode of discipline for a human 
soul. He has varied means for putting one to the 
proof. In some cases He allows men to gather great 
riches, in order to bring them to a revelation of them- 
selves. In Jeshurun's case prosperity set Jeshurun 
to kicking — kicking against a spiritual worship of 
Jehovah in favor of idolatry; that particular form 
of kicking characteristic of Israel's history through 
age after age; that history a series of national re- 
lapses into heathenism; and that history persisting 
until God whipped idolatry out of His chosen people 
with many a blow from the lash of exile. 

What did prosperity do for Abraham? It made 
him a man of pre-eminent faith. It kept his tent 
sweet with piety. It ripened his soul for heaven. 

Look at Lot in comparison. Where do we find 
Lot, after he had selfishly chosen what should have 
been given to his uncle Abraham, the well watered 
plain of the Jordan? We find him pitching his tent 
towards Scdom. Then we find him thoroughly tine- 



THE KICKING JESHURUN 85 

tured and saturated with Sodom's life. Waxing fat 
in that wicked city, Lot had no influence as a relig- 
ious man. His prosperity almost ruined his soul. 

So with Solomon. As his possessions increased, 
his spirituality declined. Behold Solomon a wor- 
shipper of strange gods! One more Jeshurun who 
"waxed fat and kicked." 

The past ages are crowded with Jeshuruns. In 
some instances prosperity was the sun that brought 
forth from the lives of men the flowers of righteous- 
ness, the aroma of those flowers yet hovering in the 
air of earth. In other instances the sun of prosperity 
filled the lives of men with writhing serpents, calling 
those serpents up into the light from hearts dark with 
evil. Listen to the hiss of Jereboam's abominations, 
and Absalom's, and Herod's, and Nero's ! 

So does God still try men with His abundant bless- 
ings. Stocks, and bonds, and houses, and lands, 
and luxuries in the home are often the figures that 
God places on the blackboard of a man's life, placing 
those figures there as a sum to be worked out, and 
God standing by to watch the result of the problem. 
It is not always in the valley that souls are put to the 
test — the valley of sickness, the valley of business re- 
verses, the valley of defeat, the valley of bereave- 
ment. As Abraham's faith was proved up the slopes 
of Mt. Moriah, so often is it in exaltation that men 
meet with discipline — upon the summit of financial 
success, the summit of triumph, the summit of un- 
broken friendship, the summit of health. 



86 THE KICKING JESHURUN 

Job was tried by prosperity, and not found want- 
ing. He was seen to be full weight in the scales of 
righteousness. Adversity came upon him at the sug- 
gestion of Satan, who thought that Job was a godly 
man simply because he had been wonderfully blessed 
of the Lord. But Satan's handcuffs, and chain, and 
dungeon, that dungeon black with loss and disease 
and the shadows of ten graves, did not blister Job's 
tongue with a single curse against God. 

Yes, adversity tries ; so does prosperity. There 
are some persons who cannot be trusted with pros- 
perity. Here is a man deeply religious. He is a 
man who has to struggle hard to gain a livelihood. 
But he is a praying man, a church-going man, a 
Bible-reading man, a Sabbath-keeping man. Sud- 
denly the tide of fortune turns from the ebb to the 
flow. Wealth comes to that man. He moves his 
family into a larger house. Velvet carpets bloom on 
the floors. Oil paintings grace the frescoed walls. 
Silver and cut glass flash upon the sideboard and the 
table of the dining room. Handsomeness and plenty 
everywhere. Jeshurun waxes fat, and, alas ! he kicks. 
In that man's heart prayer is silent. He is a stranger 
in the sanctuary. His Bible gathers dust, exchanged 
for the newspaper and the sensational novel. The 
Sabbath is his day for recreation, driving his gold- 
mounted team through the streets, or boarding an ex- 
cursion train for God's seashore turned into a re- 
cruiting agency for the devil's soldiers of intemper- 
ance and lust. I care not what the name of the mai? 



THE KICKING JESHURUN 87 

may be, he is a Jeshurun who has forsaken the God 
who made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his 
salvation. It will take the crack of a sheriff's ham- 
mer to knock that man into his senses. Prosperity 
has made him insane. 

How many Jeshuruns there are who thus kick be- 
cause they have waxed fat ! This, perhaps, is the rea- 
son that God keeps so many persons growing in the 
shade. They thrive better there in a spiritual sense 
than they would if transplanted into the open under 
the full blaze of the sun. It takes one who has a clear 
head to stand upon some great elevation. A dizzy 
brain must not attempt the feat of climbing high. 
Some persons get spiritual vertigo when they are ex- 
alted. It is better to be low for a season in one's 
school-room class, if graduation day find you at the 
top, than to be first now and last afterwards. So it 
is better to be humble on earth and wear a crown in 
heaven, than to be proud here and then be cast head- 
long into hell. If God is blessing your soul with His 
grace, do not ask Him for worldly wealth, or worldly 
position, or worldly fame. You might become a 
kicking Jeshurun. 

III. I ask you to note the thought that the fidelity 
of nations may become strained by success. It is of 
Israel as a nation that Moses here is speaking. It 
was this people, supremely happy, a Jeshurun fa- 
vored of God, who had kicked, forsaking the Lord 
who had given them their liberty from Egyptian 
bondage. His the hand that had arrested the whip 



88 THE KICKING JESHURUN 

of the taskmaster. His the hand that had bound up 
the wounds of their slavery. But against that benev- 
olent hand, fairly charged with goodness, they had 
rebelled. What a terrible indictment Moses brings 
against Jeshurun! After describing the triumphs 
of the people of Israel, speaking of their waxing fat, 
and telling of their proud and wanton behavior un- 
der the figure of kicking, he proceeds to specify their 
wickedness. Listen! "They sacrificed unto devils, 
not unto God ; to gods whom they knew not ; to new 
gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared 
not. Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmind- 
ful, and hast forsaken God that formed thee." 

There is a striking similarity between the history 
of Israel and our history as a people. The God of 
the Red Sea and the wilderness journey to Canaan 
was the God who guided the Nina, the Pinta and the 
Santa Maria, the ships of Christopher Columbus, 
across the Atlantic Ocean to these American shores. 
The God who afterwards broke down the walls of 
Jericho under the feeble blast of rams' horns was the 
same God who stood beside our fathers at Lexing- 
ton, and Concord, and Bunker Hill, and Princeton, 
and Yorktown. Again stood He with them at New 
Orleans in the War of 1812. Again stood He with 
them in the late Civil conflict, when brother fought 
against brother, God then teaching this nation 
through the awful discipline of wasted harvest fields 
and the thunder of artillery and the flash of bayo- 
nets and swords and a deluge of precious blood, a 



THE KICKING JESHURUN 89 

lesson that bears fruit to-day in the million-miled or- 
chard of a firmly united commonwealth. Again 
stood He with our living kindred on the decks of 
the fleets that gave their guns voice in Manila Bay 
and in the harbor of Santiago, those guns putting to 
silence the tyranny of a worn-out kingdom, and echo- 
ing around the world the fact that God had moved 
our nation to the very front among the governmental 
powers of the earth. As a citizen of this country, on 
this Sabbath that is the golden door of another Inde- 
pendence Day, I am proud to speak of God's provi- 
dence written in shining letters upon every thread 
of the Stars and Stripes. 

But there is danger that we may become a Jeshu- 
run. We have already waxed fat. Alas ! if we 
should kick against Him who has been leading us 
along the pathway of the years. It is only righteous- 
ness that exalts a nation. Napoleon Bonaparte was 
wrong when he said that God is on the side of those 
who have the strongest battalions, his own inglorious 
downfall and shattered sceptre proving him to be 
wrong. God is on the side of those who are faithful 
to Him. Let this nation become a Jeshurun, utterly 
corrupt in its legislative halls; let bribery altogether 
stain its courts of justice; let us be a people setting 
up the golden calf of money as an object of worship; 
let us be anarchists who put aside divine law in re- 
gard to the sacredness of the Sabbath and everything 
else religious; let us tolerate without indignation 
that modern uncleanness, Mormonism; let us be a 



90 THE KICKING JESHURUN 

land whose liquor bill far exceeds what it spends for 
carrying the Cross of Jesus Christ to benighted 
neighbors beyond the seas, this last woeful thing al- 
ready a fact, and one before which all true Christians 
recoil; then must judgment unsheathe its flaming 
sword against us. There are no national founda- 
tions so strong that they cannot be thrown down. 
Rome stood for twelve centuries. When the time 
came for its destruction, God hurled that Empire into 
the dust. Were it not for the millions of God's peo- 
ple who belong to our citizenship, Christ telling us 
that His disciples are the salt of the earth, acting as 
a preservative in the midst of rottenness, it is prob- 
able that God's hand would already be upon the hilt 
of the sword of judgment, waiting to draw that 
sword from its scabbard and cut this nation to pieces, 
scattering the fragments upon the wind of His anger. 
"God save the State !" But you and I must help Him 
save it. As individual members of this Republic, it 
is incumbent upon you and me to fear God and keep 
His commandments. If we do not set an example of 
godliness before our fellowmen, we cannot expect 
any righteousness from them. Let us be known first 
in all things as citizens of heaven. While it is not 
wrong to wax fat it is wrong to kick. 

Yes; we are a highly favored people. But our 
prosperity is of God. To Him, therefore, be dedi- 
cated not only our churches, but also our mills and 
shops, and stores, and banks, every place where in- 
dustry and commerce are, from banded wheels and 



THE KICKING JESHURUN 91 

clanging anvils and jarring picks and rustling silks 
and clinking gold and silver, as from a great organ, 
pouring forth a doxology to Him from whom all 
blessings flow. As eighty millions of people sit down 
every day at a table provided by the Lord God Al- 
mighty, let there be nowhere under it the kicking 
feet of a single Jeshurun! 



The Triumphs of Christianity 

And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch. 
Acts ii : 26. 

Since this item of history was recorded nearly 
nineteen centuries have passed away. Christianity 
then was an infant; now it is a giant. Rocked in a 
Jewish cradle, it has outgrown its early culture, and 
made for itself an environment that is world-wide. 

When once it has learned to fly, an eaglet cannot be 
kept in the nest that gave it birth. Yonder is the 
sunny air, and beyond is the blue sky ; and the sweep 
of its pinions carries it forth and upward, till, with 
far-reaching vision, it looks down upon the moun- 
tains below, and beholds them shrink into mole hills. 

Like that is Christianity. The old name applied 
to its adherents, that of Galileans and Nazarenes, 
was soon exchanged for one that lifted this new 
spiritual force from the narrowness of provincialism, 
and sent it forth upon a mission that was cosmopoli- 
tan in its extent and purpose. First in Antioch, a 
Grecian city, were the disciples called Christians. 

I would remind you, however, that this new name 
given to the disciples was a nickname. The Anti- 
ochians were noted for their humor. This term, 
therefore, was the outcome of sarcasm, that peculiar 
form of wit that hides a sting behind its smile, like 



TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 93 

the playfulness of a tiger over its victim, always end- 
ing in death by paw and tooth. Seizing upon the 
fact that these men preached much about the Christ, 
the inventive genius of jesting minds conceived the 
name of Christian. There was a sneer in the appel- 
lation. It was meant to be a term of reproach. 

But, ah! they built better than they knew. That 
scornful name, originating in Antioch only a few 
years after the cricifixion of -Christ, has traveled in 
triumph through all the following ages. Throwing 
off the outward cloak that was jestingly placed upon 
it, lo! it speedily stood forth robed in divinity. It 
wears to-day a crown that outshines all other crowns 
as easily as the sun outshines the light of a glow 
worm; for that name Christian is a king that rules 
kings. It reigns in absolute supremacy. 

Thus, my friends, does God cause the wrath of 
men to praise Him. Here is a striking illustration 
of that mysterious law by which the will of God and 
the will of man, opposed to the higher will, work to- 
gether in harmony, and produce results that God in- 
tends by His decree. With contempt upon their 
unhallowed lips, these people of Antioch pronounced 
a name that shall endure forever to the honor of 
Christ. With hands of hatred they reared to a de- 
spised Jew a monument of mud; but the passing 
years transformed it into an imposing shaft of mar- 
ble, which even the dying convulsions of the globe 
cannot shake from its granite foundation. My theme 
therefore is, The Triumphs of Christianity. 



94 TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 

I. Let us glance at the religion of Jesus Christ 
making its way among the multitudes of mankind. 
In its infancy, as we have seen, it was a subject of 
jest. But any condition of babyhood is one of im- 
maturity. No one could have guessed the possibili- 
ties that lay in the infantile brain of Daniel Webster* 
In the cooing of those little lips there was no hint of 
the eloquence that afterwards thundered its rhetoric 
at Bunker Hill, or discharged its oratoric artillery 
in the Senate Chamber of the Capitol at Washing- 
ton. One may smile at the homely features of a new- 
born child, and live to see the day when smiles are 
displaced by admiration. 

So could the witty inhabitants of Antioch afford 
to make merry over the new sect of that time, which 
had but comparatively a few followers; but who 
laughs now at Christianity? It has come God's 
hour to laugh in the heavens, and hold in derision 
those who despise His royal Son. 

It is said that facts are stubborn things. That of 
Christianity has a special obstinacy that is all its owa 
From a few thousand converts in its early days it has 
swollen into the arithmetic of over two hundred mil- 
lion souls. The addition of the first century of its 
growth has been supplanted by multiplication. But 
this is only a mere suggestion of the increase that is 
yet to be. The day is coming when even multiplica- 
tion will be too slow to enumerate its triumphs. Then 
the process of growth will have to call geometric 
progression to its aid. Even that will fail. Looking 



TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 95 

off upon the throngs of the redeemed, John was un- 
able to count them. He spoke of them as being ten 
thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thou- 
sands. Then he afterwards added, almost holding 
his breath at the stupendous thought, "a great multi- 
tude that no man could number." It was like a view 
of the heavens at nightfall, here and there a star 
bursting to sight, then, as the shadows deepen, scores 
flashing their silvery fires athwart the firmament, 
then hundreds, then thousands, galaxies and con- 
stellations wheeling into line in parade of magnifi- 
cence, till, with his vision enlarged by the telescope, 
the astronomer stands in the presence of a universe 
whose worlds are sown through it with a profusion 
that staggers the mind and strikes imagination 
dumb. 

Thus, through history, do we behold Christianity 
to-day as it went forth from Jerusalem, and stepped 
rapidly onward over the Roman Empire, steadily 
gathering its recruits, as the army marched, until 
now we see it swaying the foremost nations of the 
globe, and still victoriously pushing its conquests 
upon every inhabited shore. 

Alexander the Great and Napoleon Bonaparte 
both sought for themselves universal dominion; but 
their ambitious lust was never gratified. The only 
conqueror of the earth is the Lord Jesus Christ. The 
only regiments that shall tramp the continents are 
Christian. The only banner that shall wave in tri- 
umph forever is the banner of the Cross. Ride on, 



96 TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 

King Jesus! Ride on! Thou art the world's only 
Sovereign. Europe is Thine. Asia is Thine. Africa 
is Thine. America is Thine. Thine are the islands 
of the sea. Ride on ! ride on ! The heathen are Thy 
inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth are 
Thy everlasting possession. Therefore, ride on ! 

I once saw a masterpiece painting of the world's 
most renowned men of war. Mounted on their spir- 
ited chargers, they were in the act of pushing their 
way to the front, while on both sides of them were 
stretched the ghastly corpses of the slain; and these 
extended far into the rear, back to the vanishing 
point of the vision, row on row of dead bodies, over 
which these warriors moved into historic fame. 

But I show you a grander picture. It is the mas- 
terpiece of Inspiration, and it hangs in the gallery of 
the Apocalypse. Look upon it, as traced by the 
wrinkled hand of the aged Apostle John! "And I 
saw heaven opened, and, behold, a white horse; and 
he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True; 
and in righteousness doth he judge and make war. 
His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head 
were many crowns ; and he had a name written, that 
no man knew, but he, himself. And he was clothed 
in a vesture dipped in blood. And his name is called, 
the Word of God. And the armies which were in 
heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in 
fine linen, white and clean." It is a picture of the 
triumphant Christ, whose numberless battalions are 
Christians. 



TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 97 

II. Again, let us glance for a moment at the tri- 
umphs of Christianity in the realm of intellect. What 
a seemingly insignificant beginning Christianity had ! 
Its divine Founder summoned around Him, not those 
who stood foremost in circles ecclesiastic, neither 
those who occupied the first rank in the scholarship 
of the day, but a few fishermen, men of lowly mind, 
and men of humble life. He chose weakness to over- 
come strength. He chose humility to remove pride. 
He chose littleness to match itself against greatness. 
But He chose wisely and well. To the thought of the 
world it might have appeared that He was taking 
the opposite course. God, however, is not dependent 
upon the forces that are noisy for the carrying out of 
His purposes. The gravitation that holds the world 
in space, and that directs the marching of innumer- 
able suns and planets over the infinite field of the uni- 
verse, works, so far as human ears are concerned, in 
absolute silence. Also with light, that tremendous 
power that lifts the forests cloudward, and animates 
every kingdom of life; it carries on it« operations 
without sound, falling so gently to its tasks, indeed, 
that no leaf is disturbed by its coming, or no slum- 
bering eyes are awakened. While God "plants His 
footsteps in the sea and rides upon the storm," He 
also moves in the quietness of things invisible, like 
a king that travels incognito, and yet loses thereby 
none of the power of his sceptre. 

I do not mean to say that the apostles of Christ 
were brainless men. They were far from that. But 



98 TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 

they were not regarded as being in possession of 
great intellectual qualities. Under the training 
which they received from a master Mind, they de- 
veloped into men of superior mental calibre. Yet, 
because many of them had followed the sea for a liv- 
ing, and one of their number had been unpatriotic 
enough to be a collector of taxes from a hated for- 
eign empire, they were by their own countrymen 
despised; and later on they and those who increased 
their sect became the subjects of Grecian wit; and 
in Antioch they were termed fanatics, the partisans 
of Christ, enthusiasts in an insane cause; for these 
were all implied in the word Christian. 

But out of that small beginning Christianity has 
widened into an ocean of intellectual influence. Who 
scorns an Amazon or a Mississippi because of the 
birth of their mighty waters in tiny springs? Who 
derides the Alps or the Sierra Nevadas because their 
mountain masonry is built up of little grains of mat- 
ter? Who despises yonder sun because its light is the 
result of countless beams? Who, therefore, can 
think of no greatness in Christianity because it was 
nursed at the breast of insignificance? 

There are many who think that the religion of 
Christ is only for those of weak minds. But that 
same religion has conquered thousands of the finest 
intellects that ever throbbed beneath the stars. Who, 
let me ask, was Paul ? He is the Demosthenes of the 
New Testament. Half of that inspired Volume is 
taken up with his life and writings. What a life that 



TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 99 

was! Not the life of a man that dribbled a few 
feeble drops of action, and then was lost to view. 
His was a life that poured itself forth with torrent 
strength and velocity. It was a flood-life that broke 
down every barrier in its way, and swept victoriously 
on into the ocean of immortality. It was a life that 
was consecrated to Jesus Christ for the carrying of 
His Cross before heathen eyes. 

One of the Grecian philosophers, it is said, walked 
the streets of his city with a lighted lantern in hand 
in the blaze of day. He was in quest of a man. But 
had he lived in Paul's time, there would have been no 
need for such parabolic sarcasm. Here was a man, 
indeed. Every inch of him was a man. Though re- 
puted to be small of stature, the weight of his bram 
cannot be estimated. That brain has charged 
eighteen centuries and more with its influence. Out 
of it has issued a theology that has shaken the 
thrones of kings, and produced whole races of intel- 
lectual giants — a theology, indeed, that has long been 
hated, which has awakened scorn in rival schools of 
thought, and at which infidelity has often put out its 
tongue in jest; but which, nevertheless, under the 
name of Calvinism, has prominently kept before the 
world the fact that God reigns in heaven and earth, 
and whose adherents to-day are like the stars for 
multitude. 

What shall I further say of the eloquence of this 
man Paul? There never was another such orator. 
Even his writings are in oratoric form. With him 



LofC. 



ioo TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 

rhetoric was not a matter of the midnight lamp, a 
laborious polishing of his sentences, but the expres- 
sion of a soul that was fired with a master passion — 
love for Christ. That princely voice rang its music 
upon the ears of philosophers and poets and gover- 
nors and kings. That majestic pen flashed light 
through the bars of prisons. Confinement in dun- 
geon walls could not crush Paul's eloquent soul. His 
body was immured, but his spirit, like that of a caged 
eagle, soared in the illimitable blue of freedom. 

Time fails me to call the roll of the world's im- 
mortals who were swayed by the religion of Jesus 
Christ. I can mention only a few of them. Who 
was Augustine? Who was Jerome? Who was Mar- 
tin Luther? Who was John Calvin? Who was 
John Knox? Who was Sir Isaac Newton, and Oli- 
ver Cromwell, and John Milton? Who were the 
Wesleys? Who was Whitefield? Who was David 
Livingstone? Who were William Gladstone, and 
Abraham Lincoln, and Robert Lee, and William 
McKinley? These are but a fragment of the illus- 
trious dead who were proud of the title of Christian. 
Yonder stands the monument that bears their fame 
to the sun. Read for yourselves the shining list of 
the intellects that bowed at the feet of Jesus Christ. 
Were these men and women of weak minds? No! 
I tell you that no other minds have so mightily pul- 
sated in thought within the air of the world. Being 
dead they yet speak. 

And what of the living? Put Christianity on trial 



TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 101 

to-day in the court room of Doubt, and there would 
be throngs on throngs of witnesses to testify in its 
behalf, and thousands of attorneys ready for its de- 
fence, and thousands of physicians to give expert 
testimony, and thousands of judges to render an opin- 
ion in the case, and thousands of jurymen to pass 
upon the matter, and bring in a verdict. 

What has Christianity done in the realm of intel- 
lect? It has colored the world's literature, so that 
the grandest poems are those upon religious themes, 
and the sublimest oratory is that which pertains to 
spiritual topics, and the most enduring fiction is that 
which deals with righteousness. It has inspired the 
world's richest music, the oratorios of Handel and 
Beethoven and Mozart, and spread the canvas of the 
world's most magnificent paintings, and held the mal- 
let and chisel of the world's loftiest architecture and 
its chastest statuary. It has penetrated every depart- 
ment of the world's intellectuality, and left every- 
where its distinctive marks. Its footprints are seen 
in all the sciences of every name. So will it continue 
its conquests, until every opposing sword is placed in 
its hands, and every foeman's banner is furled in its 
presence. That will be the dawning of the day that 
shall never end, when the rising Sun of Righteous- 
ness shall gild every mountain-top, and flash His 
flames into every valley, and irradiate every ocean 
and forest and plain with His undying sheen. 

III. Once more, let us glance at the triumphs of 
this religion in the inner life of humanity. Look, for 



102 TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 

instance, at its power in the territory of character. 
By its potent influence lives that were loathsome 
with sin, covered all over with the scales of a moral 
leprosy, the very heart itself in the grasp of a death- 
ful corruption, have been transformed into beaute- 
ous health. Not the beauty of a -snowfall, simply 
hiding from view a natural ugliness by the art of si- 
lently distributing virgin flakes among and upon it; 
but by a revolution that takes down the old and 
builds the new. It has breathed upon uncleanness 
and made it pure. It has opened the eyes of the 
drunkard to the vision of the serpent in the intoxicat- 
ing cup and given him lasting sobriety. It has brushed 
all profanity from the swearer's blistered lips, and 
caused them to blossom with praises to God. It has 
exchanged hatred for love, frowns for smiles, cheat- 
ing for honesty, lies for truth. Do you tell me that 
miracles are an impossibility? The past ages are 
crowded with just such miracles as I have men- 
tioned. Do you tell me that the day of miracles is 
past? Miracles such as I have named are of hourly 
occurrence. Where the grace of God performs its 
full work, it gives regeneration to the souls of men. 
The new birth is one of the greatest of miracles. 

Also has this religion shown its power in trouble. 
The grief, or the reverse of business, or the bitter 
disappointment, that has for the many stretched the 
suicide's rope, or mixed the suicide's poison, or 
loaded the suicide's gun or revolver, has, under the 
sustaining strength of Christianity, lifted the many 



TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 103 

into an atmosphere of consolation, charged with the 
sunbeams of cheer and the oxygen of gladness. 

Look again at Paul as an example. Was there 
ever a man more tried than he? Listen to his count 
of tribulations in his autobiographic letters. He be- 
gan his Christian life under a cross; and that cross 
increased in weight all along the pathway of the 
years, until, at length, it bore his body down into 
martyrdom. But in the hatred of his foes, in the 
public whippings of his persecutors, in the bruises 
and blood of flagellation, in the dampness and noi- 
someness of jails, in privations and shipwrecks, in the 
painfulness and weariness of long journeys, and 
finally in the Mamertine dungeon at Rome, where he 
waited for the stroke of Nero's sword, hear his vic- 
torious shout: "None of these things move me; 
neither count I my life dear unto myself!" 

Yea, the closing hour has come. A soldier beckons 
him forth into the day. His execution is about to 
take place. Yonder I see him. How does he go? 
Not as a coward that trembles in view of death. In 
all that prematurely aged frame there is not a single 
tremor of fear. Upon that wrinkled brow there is 
not the faintest pallor of dread. His step is that of 
a prince advancing to his coronation. "Wait, sol- 
dier," I hear him say. Taking his pen between finger 
and thumb, he writes to Timothy, his son in the Gos- 
pel, a sentence that has encircled millions of the necks 
of the dying with gems that flash with a light never 
seen on sea or land : "I have fought the good fight ; 



104 TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 

I have finished my course; I have kept the faith; 
henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of right- 
eousness." 

Under the spell of that burst of oratory the soul of 
this veteran of the Cross mounted the shining hills 
of immortality, and passed in honor through the up- 
lifted gates of pearl. 

That was not an anomalous experience. Multi- 
plied Christians have tasted the sweetness of it. You 
and I have had its nectarine cup pressed to our lips 
time and time again. The religion of Jesus Christ 
has hushed many a sob born in our breast through 
sorrow, and glorified many a tear, and illumined 
many a shadow. Even in the deepest gloom the 
Christian soul that has throbbed in sympathy with 
the first two stanzas of Longfellow's poem, "The 
Rainy Day," has echoed the pean of the final stanza 
in a doxology of triumph : 

"Be still, sad heart, and cease repining; 
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining!" 

Also in the hour of death has this religion scattered 
its sunbeams over many a tossed and rumpled pillow. 
Stephen, battered with rocks, what sayest thou? 
"Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." John Wesley, what 
sayest thou? "The best of all is, God is with us." 
John Powson, what sayest thou? "My dying bed is 
a bed of roses." Alfred Cookman, what sayest thou? 
"I am sweeping through the gates washed in the 
blood of the Lamb." Frances Willard, what sayest 



TRIUMPHS OF CHRISTIANITY 105 

thou? "How beautiful it is to be with God." Wil- 
liam McKinley, what sayest thou? "Nearer, my 
God to Thee. It is God's way ; His will be done." 

I seem to hear these voices to-day, and the voices of 
millions more, like the voices of many waters, the 
voices of the heroes and heroines of Christianity in 
past centuries, of recent years also, and of this pres- 
ent hour; the voices, too, of dear ones and friends; 
and, hark! They mingle, as if a great organ were 
pealing, and a mighty choir were singing, the thun- 
der of the instrument and the rolling of the anthem 
breaking forth into this one overwhelming strain of 
the oratorio of Christianity: "O death, where is thy 
sting ? O grave, where is thy victory ?" 

My friend, are you a Christian? Know, then, that 
out of a name that issued from reproach has come 
forth a title that is prouder than that of any earthly 
czar or emperor. Wear it in your heart, and show 
its lustre in your life. Are you not a Christian ? Then 
you are gathering the weeds of earth, and passing the 
flowers by; or covering yourself with ashes, when 
you might be adorned with pearls ; or languishing in 
a prison cell, when you might be a prince of God in 
everlasting freedom of soul. 



The Fowls of the Air 

Behold the fowls of the air. Matthew 6 : 26. 

In the springtime or early summer I like to preach 
a sermon in keeping with those seasons of the year. 
I am accustomed then to call attention to the flowers 
or the trees or the grass. But my discourse this 
morning shall have in it the gloss of bird feathers 
and the whistle of bird bills. 

Flowers are God's thoughts in poetry, some of 
the flowers blank verse, some lyrics, some pastorals. 
Trees are God's thoughts gathered into the libraries 
of the woods and mountains and orchards. Grasses 
are God's thoughts written over the fields and along 
the banks of streams, those thoughts punctuated with 
buttercup and dandelion and daisy. But birds are 
God's thoughts on the wing, and spilling music 
through the air. In this mountain sermon from the 
lips of the Prince of preachers, we are called upon 
to observe the birds. Christ said, "Behold the 
fowls." 

I. I would remark, that the Bible is full of birds. 
We hear the rush of their wings upon almost every 
page of the Bible. In the first chapter of Genesis 
they fly forth above the earth in obedience to God's 
command, the same voice that said, "Let there be 
light," saying, "Let fowl fly in the face of the firma- 



THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 107 

ment of heaven." Starting thus in Genesis, birds 
hop and soar and circle all the way through the Bible 
to Revelation, in that book the birds summoned by an 
angel standing in the sun to a great feast, that angel 
crying with a loud voice, and saying to all the fowls 
that fly in the midst of heaven, "Come, and gather 
yourselves together unto the supper of the great 
God ; that ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh 
of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the 
flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the 
flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and 
great." Birds everywhere in the Bible. 

In Exodus we read of quails. In Leviticus a dis- 
tinction is made between birds clean and birds un- 
clean, one kind for food and another kind not to be 
eaten — the eagle, the ossifrage, the osprey, the vul- 
ture, the kite, the raven, the owl, the nighthawk, the 
cuckoo, the swan, the pelican, the stork, the heron, 
the lapwing and the bat, all being an abomination 
to the mouth of the children of Israel, God prescrib- 
ing for those people their bill of fare, this accounting 
for the healthiness of the Hebrew race, that healthi- 
ness persisting to this present day. 

In Deuteronomy we hear the flapping of eagle pin- 
ions, the broad wings of that monarch among birds, 
as they go sailing in majestic curves through the 
sunny air, and instructing the eaglets of the nest In 
the art of flight, used as an illustration of the leader- 
ship of God among His people. 

So the birds continue flying through every book 



108 THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 

of the Bible. The crow, the crane, the dove, the 
partridge, the pigeon, the stork, the sparrow, the 
swallow, and many others that I have not the time to 
mention, all winging their way through this library 
of inspired volumes, He who made the birds of every 
name catching some of them in the net of one of His 
sermons, and saying to the audience gathered around 
His mountain pulpit, and to the larger congregation 
of all succeeding time, "Behold the fowls of the air." 

In studying this subject I was surprised at the 
wealth of allusion to birds in the Scriptures. When 
David wished for an illustration of God's mighty 
protection and tender care of His children, he found 
that illustration in the brooding of an eagle over her 
young, saying, "He shall cover thee with his feath- 
ers, and under his wings shalt thou trust." When he 
wishes that he might leave his troubles and have 
peace of heart, he exclaims, "Oh, that I had the 
wings of a dove, that I might fly away and be at 
rest!" Speaking of the omnipresence of God, he 
employs one of the sublimest figures of all Biblical 
rhetoric, saying, "If I take the wings of the morning, 
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there 
shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold 
me." "The wings of the morning!" Wings of light! 
Wings of silver flaming into sunrise hues of crimson 
and purple and emerald and gold ! Wings that wheel 
swiftly over the mountains and flash across the 
oceans ! Wonderful figure ! 

So when the phrase-maker of the Book of Pro- 



THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 109 

verbs would illustrate the uncertainty of earth-born 
wealth, he says, "Riches make themselves wings; 
they fly away as an eagle toward heaven." You and 
I have seen them flying away — stocks and bonds and 
houses and lands and bank-bills and currency flying, 
flying, flying! 

What multitudes of wings in the Bible! Wings 
in the Psalms. Wings in Ezekiel. Wings in Isaiah. 
Wings in Zechariah. Wings in Malachi. Wings! 
Wings ! Wings ! 

So when Christ would tell of His solicitude for 
the nation that had rejected Him, standing within 
view of the Cross of Calvary, He cries out, every 
word a tear, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that 
killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent 
unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy chil- 
dren together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens 
under her wings, and ye would not !" A lowly meta- 
phor, but transformed by Christ into beauty, a poul- 
try yard becoming a paradise and a barn door the 
gate of heaven. I have often seen young chicks 
wander away from the old mother hen in the broad 
sunshine of the day, but at nightfall they were glad 
enough to hide under her sheltering wings. At the 
nightfall of judgment for Jerusalem, forty years af- 
ter Christ's pathetic outcry, there were no outspread 
wings of protection for that people. Then was the 
air darkened with the wings of the Roman eagles — 
wings of famine ; wings of flame ; wings of sword — 
and the Hebrew Commonwealth ceased to be. No 



no THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 

wonder that Christ wept when He spoke of His de- 
sire to gather the people under His omnipotence who 
would not seek that divine refuge ! 

The Bible thus having in it so much of bird wings, 
we cannot afford to slight the words of Christ when 
He says, "Behold the fowls of the air." But as we 
have looked at some of the birds of the Scriptures, 
let us now come closer and look at them in Nature. 

II. In the further opening of the text, I ask you 
to notice the anatomical structure of the birds. Man 
and the animals allied with him were made for walk- 
ing, and running, and climbing. Fish were made for 
swimming. Birds were made for flying. The same 
wisdom that planned the anatomy of life that moves 
slowly over the earth, as in walking, or swiftly, as in 
running, and the anatomy of life that cleaves the 
waters of creek, and river, and ocean with scales and 
fins, also planned the anatomy of the creatures of the 
air, whether a humming-bird with its marvelous vi- 
bration of wing that keeps it poised over a flower, 
into which it thrusts its bill and collects therefrom 
nectarine food, or an eagle with its pinions bathed 
in the clouds and its gaze sunward. The bones of 
flying fowl are so constructed as to render such fowl 
capable of flight, those bones having cavities that are 
much larger in proportion to the size of the fowl than 
are in the bones of quadrupeds. Those large cavities 
are filled with air. The whole make-up of birds is in 
reference to their use of wings. They were designed 
to fly. Look at a bird's wing! On the inside con- 



THE FOWLS OF THE AIR in 

cave; on the outside convex; both of those shapes 
necessary for lifting the bird's body through the re- 
sisting atmosphere and steering it, with the aid of the 
tail, from point to point along the aerial journey. 
Upon the wing of wren, and robin, and owl, and al- 
batross God has written His autograph, the same 
hand that pencils that mighty name in stars upon the 
broad sheet of midnight skies also tracing it along the 
feathers of every wing that beats the air. Let those 
who say, "There is no God," not only read the as- 
tronomical proofs of God's existence, but also read 
the proofs that are on the anatomy of all atmospheric 
creatures. The canary that sings in its prison-cage, 
the parrot that talks from its perch, the swallow that 
builds its nest in the chimney, and the saucy black- 
bird that follows the farmer's furrow in search of 
food, are all so many living arguments for the being 
of God. "Behold the fowls of the air." 

How do the birds keep their hold at night upon 
their resting-place? With their heads under their 
wings, and sound asleep, one would think that they 
would fall to the ground. But there is a mechanical 
contrivance in the leg of a bird by which, when it 
bends its legs to rest, the toes and claws are gripped 
to the perch, and so remaining as long as the legs are 
bent in the sitting posture. One of the pastimes of 
boyhood days is the catching of the tendons in a 
fowl's severed leg that accomplish this action and 
pulling them, so as to see the claws move. God 
giveth the birds safety in sleep. 



ii2 THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 

Oh, the wonders of the bird creation! Feathers 
and wings and oiling apparatus for the dressing of 
their coat, and eyes and ears and internal organs, 
all showing forth the architectural skill of God. I 
have seen enough ingenuity in the arrangement of 
a chicken's eye to keep me in admiration for the rest 
of my life. Two curtains in that eye, one closing up- 
ward from the outside, the other closing downward 
from the inside. No wonder that Christ said, "Be- 
hold the fowls." The whole anatomical structure of 
birds reveals the wisdom and love of God. God's 
benevolent design seen in the frame of every bird 
that ever lifted voice in the woods or spread itself 
to fly, racing with sunbeams. Says that same Christ, 
"Are ye not much better than they?" 

III. Again, behold the birds at their nest-building. 
Just now they are very busy. As they work, their 
hearts are overflowing with song, some of which 
they spill melodiously upon the air. The houses they 
are rearing will have in them but one room, and that 
will be a sitting-room, afterwards to be turned into 
a nursery ! The music that now is being woven into 
the hours of the day, quieting at nightfall into low 
chirp and subdued whistle, will fade; but there will 
be other weavings, the wings of younger birds the 
shuttles that will carry the threads of harmony back 
and forth through the musical pattern. Since the 
world began God has not left the world without this 
aerial minstrelsy. He never will so leave it. The 
birds of Eden were the capital with which God 



THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 113 

started the world in song. That capital has been 
bearing compound interest through all the succeed- 
ing centuries. Every nest is the forerunner of three 
or five nests. 

I notice that the birds build their nests high, hav- 
ing in mind the idea that height gives protection. 
Where did the birds learn that fact ? In God's school. 
Oh, that men would not be such dullards in the same 
school ! It is a shame to be outranked in learning by 
the birds. The trouble with many persons is that 
they build their lives too low. Lord Byron was 
gifted with the wings of imagination; but his nest 
was in the mire of depravity. Robert Burns was like- 
wise gifted; but his nest was in the bog of sensual 
appetite. The young man of the parable left the 
home-nest of lofty principle and righteous living to 
make a nest for himself. His nest was torn of 
swines' feet and swines' snout. The only safe nest- 
ing-place for any soul is among the branches of the 
tree of Calvary's Cross. 

When I see one loitering around the door of a sa- 
loon, giving loose rein to the passions of his nature, 
or going into bad company, I think, "Another low 
nest!" When I see one seated at a gaming table, 
or practicing dishonesty, or false to the truth, I 
think again, "Another low nest!" When I 
see a maiden with her eyes wide open consent- 
ing in wedlock with one who toys with the ser- 
pent of intoxication, I think still again, "Another low 
nest!" 
8 



H4 THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 

How many marriage-nests have been irretrievably 
ruined by the foul hoofs of drunkenness! O young 
woman of pure heart and clean life, fair of feature, 
and winsome in manner, have high ideals, and keep 
them high, even if you have to wait forever for the 
building of a home-nest as lofty as your ideals are! 
Better one life wrecked than two. Say to him who 
asks you to join him in building, "Who is your ar- 
chitect? And has he planned a structure equal to 
my thought? That thought of mine soars where 
eagles fly!" Oh, never, never, never, occupy with 
another a nest on the ground ! The risk is far greater 
than you can afford to take. 

A bird's nest is to me a poem of wonder. How 
beautifully it is woven ! Sticks and straw and feath- 
ers and hair gathered by the industrious birds from 
varied sources, and constructed into the poetry of a 
nest that will some day burst into musical chirps, 
those chirps the prelude to the oratorios and sym- 
phonies of the orchards and gardens. 

So may we weave into our lives, through the grace 
of God, the fibres of righteousness, those fibres after- 
wards breaking out into the unceasing song of praise 
to God in the chorals of heaven. But if that is to be, 
now is the time to begin the work — now, while the 
flowers are blooming, and the trees are full of leaves, 
and the skies are bright with the siftings of the sun. 
There is no nest-building in December. Let not 
death find us without the righteousness of Christ as 
an everlasting nest. 



THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 115 

IV. Again, behold the birds fed by the hand of 
God. Says Christ, "They sow not, neither do they 
reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly 
Father feedeth them." 

Now, Christ was not a rhapsodist who indulged 
in mere sentimentality. The care of God for the 
fowls of the air is the one point to which Christ in- 
vites attention when He asks that we behold the 
fowls. His argument is that the birds are supplied 
with food through God. These that Christ refers to 
are not dead birds, stuffed, and set up within a mu- 
seum or academy of science. The only thing dead 
about them is the language in which Matthew re- 
ported the Preacher's sermon. These are living birds 
— birds with fluttering wings, with shining plumage, 
with song-rippling bills. The birds they are that cir- 
cled within sight of Christ's mountain auditory. The 
birds they are that have been flying through all the 
centuries. The birds they are that hopped over your 
lawn this morning, or from the branches of the trees 
that shade your home voiced for your ears a matin 
carol. "The fowls of the air." 

Christ says that God feeds the birds. Did you ever 
stop to think what great quantities of provision God 
has to supply for the fowls of the air ? Food for the 
eagles. Food for the ravens. Food for the spar- 
rows. Food for the almost endless varieties of fly- 
ing life in the atmosphere around the world. Yet 
none of the birds ever go hungry. God stocks the 
market where they buy without money and without 



n6 THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 

price. God spreads their table at which they break- 
fast and dine and sup — table of bare rock under a 
canopy of cloud; table of tree-branch under a can- 
opy of leaves ; table of grass and brown earth under 
a canopy of orchards. God gives them their meat in 
due season. 

I had often wondered where all the birds get their 
food ; but observing them, I soon learned the sources 
of their supply. Insects in the air, grubs in the bark 
of trees, berries on the bushes, worms in the soil — 
these the birds find every day. A piece of sod turned 
up by the spade or the plow is a veritable granary 
and slaughter-house opened to the birds. Out of a 
shovelful of black earth thrown into their pen 
chickens will scratch a banquet, afterwards wiping 
their bills upon a napkin of dry dust. God feeds all 
the fowls. 

Notice the argument of Christ. He rises from the 
smaller to the greater — from the fowls of the air to 
men, and women, and children. The irresistible con- 
clusion of His parabolic logic is that God cares more 
for His own immortal children than He does for the 
birds. "Are ye not much better than they?" 

Have you come into God's house worried this 
morning? Anxiety from any cause is mind sickness 
and heart sickness. Here is a prescription that will 
cure you, if you have faith. It is from the knowl- 
edge and skill of the great Physician. That pre- 
scription is compounded of God's providence. "Be- 
hold the fowls of the air." 



THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 117 

There is a legend which tells about Christ as a boy. 
While playing one day with His companions, He 
made some birds out of clay. He stood those clay 
birds on the ground. An old Pharisee came along, 
and frowningly looked at the sport. Then he kicked 
those clay birds and broke them, scattering their 
fragments with his foot over the ground. But the 
legend goes on to relate how that Christ the boy 
waved His hand over those fragments, and how that 
they were repaired, afterwards taking wing, and fly- 
ing heavenward in song. 

That is only a legend. But Christ can wave His 
hand over our broken plans, and mend them by His 
grace of love; and wave His hand over our griefs, 
over our cares, over our bereavements, and give them 
tuneful flight to the heaven where tears never fall. 

"Behold the fowls of the air." That means, Look 
up! Get your eyes off the ground! Look away 
from earth and see the broad expanse of sunshine in 
which fly the promises of God! The air is full of 
wings. Behold them! "Are not five sparrows sold 
for two farthings, and not one of them is forgotten 
before God? But even the very hairs of your head 
are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; ye are of 
more value than many sparrows." All the birds 
of creation do not equal one human soul. In God's 
storehouse there is enough for every one of God's 
children. They shall never want. They shall not 
want bread. They shall not want clothing. They 
shall not want shelter. They shall not want grace 



n8 THE FOWLS OF THE AIR 

for the trials of life. God's mouth hath spoken it. 
That mouth cannot lie. Sooner could the stars of 
midnight skies fall to earth. The same omnipotent 
hand that keeps those stars to their orbits also guides 
the fowls of the air. Shall that hand fail to keep you 
and me? Never! Never! Not while there is a 
foundation beneath the throne of God. 

Friends, let us more than look up. Let us take 
eagle wings and mount the skies of faith, leaving 
dust and cloud far below, soaring with unwearied 
pinions into the very light of our Father's face. 



Green Pastures 

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. Psalm 23 : 2. 

The sweetest and most beautiful of David's poems ! 
This is the canary of all the Psalms. It has been 
singing through many a century. It warbles its mel- 
ody in sunshine and rain, in health and sickness, in 
prosperity and adversity, in joy and sorrow, in pleas- 
ure and pain. Even in the darkest night does it sing. 
When the shadows of evening are stretched out other 
birds hush their notes. Silence in the gardens. Si- 
lence in the orchards. Silence in the woods. But 
this bird of heaven never ceases its song. Death 
itself has not sufficient strength of grip to choke its 
voice. 

This Psalm is a cluster of roses plucked from the 
garden of the Lord. It is a symphony in a concert 
hall. It is a banquet in a king's palace. It is a 
breeze from angel wings. It is the fragrant breath 
of God's love. Rather would I have written it than 
to have penned all the sonnets of Shakespeare or 
Mrs. Browning. Among all the poems of all the ages 
it wears the brightest crown. 

Simply as a piece of rhetorical composition this 
Psalm is superb. The rhythm of it is music. The 
language of it is music. The thought of it is music. 
From its opening words to its closing words it is all 



120 GREEN PASTURES 

music. It has been admired by many a literary brain. 
It has won praise from many a distinguished pair of 
lips. Better than that; it has soothed many a child 
of God in anguish of heart, and been a lullaby that 
has put many a saint gently to sleep. Infancy lisps 
it in the cradle. Youth chants it in the pauses be- 
tween games. Manhood repeats it in the noontide of 
the years. Middle life hums it in the going down of 
the sun from the zenith. Old age speaks it with 
trembling tongue in the purple glow of the twilight 
and under the silvery sheen of the stars before the 
night hath fully come. The inspiration of the Holy 
Spirit conceived it and gave it birth. 

This Psalm has been the text of many a sermon. 
But I cannot treat the whole of it in one discourse. 
There is enough material in it for a volume. I 
simply call your attention to one little patch of color 
in this lustrous rainbow of divine rhetoric. "He 
maketh me to lie down in green pastures." 

I. I would remark, we have here set forth the rich- 
ness of a righteous life. "Green pastures." God's 
spiritual sheep are not left to browse in some barren 
waste, with only here and there a spear of grass to 
relieve the nakedness of the mountainside, or valley, 
or field. He leads them into pastures that are 
clothed with an abundance of succulent provision. 
"Green pastures"; or, as it reads in the margin, fol- 
lowing more closely the Hebrew in which the Psalm 
was originally written, "pastures of tender grass." 

I do not know what was in David's mind when he 



GREEN PASTURES 121 

penned this sentence; but I imagine that he was 
thinking of God's Word. Here is the richest of pas- 
ture for the sheep of the great Shepherd. It is far 
richer pasture now than it was in David's day. Then 
the bars of that field enclosed only a few acres called 
the "Law of the Lord." But to-day that pasture- 
ground is greatly enlarged, God adding to it after 
David's time, and continuing to add to it, setting the 
bars farther and farther away, until those bars en- 
closed a wide sweep of land, beginning at Genesis on 
one side, ending at Revelation on the other side. 

Did you ever stop to think of the thousands upon 
thousands of sheep that have fed upon the rich pas- 
ture of God's Word ? Call them up in imagination if 
you can. Even the strongest imagination fails to call 
them up. Go number the leaves of autumnal forests 
in their dying magnificence. Go number the sand- 
diamonds that have been strewn along the ocean's 
beach. Go number the star-pearls that are clustered 
around the breast of midnight skies. Sheep in Dav- 
id's day feeding upon that pasture. Sheep in Isaiah's 
day. Sheep in Daniel's day. Sheep in Malachi's 
day. Sheep in Matthew's day, and John's, and 
Paul's. Sheep in the first century of the Christian 
Era ; in the second century ; in the third, and fourth, 
and fifth; in all the centuries, taking in the 
millions of this present twentieth century; those 
sheep in Europe, in Asia, in Africa, in America, and 
in the islands of the sea. They are like the cloud- 
sheep that God's hand leads to pasture over summer 



122 GREEN PASTURES 

skies. Uncounted throngs. And yet those pastures 
of the Word of God still green. Any other pasture 
would have been long ago reduced to sterility. 

But in the very face of this overwhelming argu- 
ment for the inspiration of the Scriptures, we are told 
that the Bible is a fallible book. There are forms 
of scholarship in these days that would mow down 
this rich pasture-field and leave nothing but stubble 
behind. There is no human scythe, however, that is 
keen enough of blade to mow it down. It has al- 
ways been green; it shall ever be green. I have no 
fear of God's Word being laid waste. 

This Book has also been more written about and 
spoken about than any other book in all the world. 
The world's libraries are freighted with volumes that 
treat of the history contained within this grand old 
Book; that treat of its ethnology; that treat 
of its astronomy ; that treat of its botany ; that 
treat of its archaeology; that treat of its 
rhetoric ; that treat of its syntax ; that treat of its 
texts — innumerable commentaries in Latin, in Ger- 
man, in French, in English, in all languages, both 
dead and living — books for the scholar; books for 
the unlearned; books for children; mountains of 
books. And what multitudes of lips have preached 
from it and are yet preaching from it! And 
no two sermons are exactly alike! And enough 
material here for other mountains of books, 
though the earthquake of the modern printing press 
is upheaving books thousands at a time ! And suffi- 



GREEN PASTURES 123 

cient matter here for millions more of sermons ! In- 
exhaustible book ! "Green pastures !" 

The reason that some Christians are so lean of 
spiritual life is that they do not suffer God to lead 
them into the green pastures of His Word. They go 
browsing very largely upon the husks of the daily 
newspaper, or the thorn-bushes of periodicals, or the 
chaff of the popular novel. You cannot fatten sheep 
upon an exclusive diet of juiceless herbs. Neither 
can Christians be aught but barren of soul, if they 
neglect the richness of the Bible. God's finest spir- 
itual sheep take the pasture that He provides; not 
that which the world, the flesh and the devil have 
barred in. I plead to-day for more feeding in the 
green pastures of the Scriptures as a means of de- 
veloping the life of the immortal spirit. 

It may have been, too, that David was thinking 
of the ordinances of God's house. These, again* 
were but poor ordinances compared with those that 
belong to this present age. Yet David calls them 
"green." For him and all the people of that time 
those pastures were in the twilight of the early morn- 
ing. Those pastures now are lying under the risen 
Sun of righteousness. 

Those persons who love the assembly of God's 
saints are usually those whose life is "rich toward 
God." When you find a lank, raw-boned, starved lot 
of sheep among the plump sheep of the Lord, you 
can be assured that they think they find better pas- 
ture at home, or at the card-party, or in the lodge, 



124 GREEN PASTURES 

than within the bars of the Sabbath services or the 
mid-week meeting for prayer. If more of the pro- 
fessed sheep of God would feed upon the ordinances 
of God's house, there would be a more abundant spir- 
itual life among the followers of Christ. 

God pity the sheep that stray over into the barren 
acres of the world ! Sorry spectacle it is when such 
sheep are seen herding with the devil's goats and 
nibbling at the weeds that grow upon the devil's 
ash-heap ! That is why some Christians are not more 
pronounced in their attitude against the various 
sins that are pushing this world away from God. 
That is often why so many are indifferent to the 
great curse of intemperance. They have forsaken 
the pasture-ground of church ordinances for forbid- 
den fields. Many a Christian is not known to be- 
long to the Lord's sheep at all, except on Commun- 
ion day, if he happens then to be present. Some even 
at that time refuse to lie down in the green pastures 
of the Lord, preferring to sit in the seat of the scorn- 
ful. 

Also may it have been that David was thinking 
of the richness of experience that comes to those who 
are in constant fellowship with God. David had been 
a shepherd, and through the long hours of the day, 
while watching his flocks, he had plenty of time for 
meditation. It was then that he rose to the blessed- 
ness of being under the eye of the great Shepherd. 
In a part of his later life, alas! David lost that fel- 
lowship with his Lord which had so enriched the days 



GREEN PASTURES 125 

of his youth. He went pasturing in the rank fields of 
sin. But through repentance, his heart-throbs of 
sorrow echoing down the ages, he was led back into 
the green pastures of righteousness. It was a terrible 
experience for David, that twin transgression of his, 
but out of those two black seeds of iniquity God 
brought the flowers of a piety that were all the more 
beautiful because of David's crimes. Two of this man's 
poems have entered into the liturgy of all sincere sor- 
row for sin and the joy of God's forgiveness. "Green 
pastures." 

Oh, the preciousness of communion with God! 
I was reading of an old German scholar who was al- 
ways calm and happy. Some one determined to learn 
the cause of the man's peacefulness of soul, secret- 
ing himself in the scholar's house for that purpose. 
He saw the old man go to his room at night, and sit 
down to read his Bible. He read on and on, through 
many an hour, reading chapter after chapter, until 
his face was all aglow. When the clock chimed the 
hour of midnight, the man rose up from his chair, 
closed his Bible, prepared for bed, saying before he 
lay down, "Blessed Lord, we are on the same terms 
yet. Good night! Good night!" That man was 
one of God's sheep in the green pastures of assur- 
ance. He knew whom he believed. There is no pas- 
ture so rich as that which God gives to His trusting 
sheep. 

II. I remark, again, that there is in the text a sug- 
gestion about the beauty of a righteous life. The 



126 GREEN PASTURES 

common opinion is that religion is associated with an 
undertaker's establishment and graveyards. The 
world regards religion with disgust. But what have 
we here? Not a cemetery with white stones looking 
ghostly in the moonlight, but an emerald field smil- 
ing in the sunshine. "Green pastures!" 

The fact is that the Bible is full of figures of 
speech that set forth the beauty of religion. What 
does Solomon say? Personifying religion under the 
name of wisdom, this royal rhetorician declares, "She 
is more precious than rubies ; and all the things thou 
canst desire are not to be compared unto her. Her 
ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are 
peace. She is a tree of life to them that lay hold 
upon her ; and happy is every one that retaineth her." 
Job says, "The crystal cannot equal it." David else- 
where says, "The righteous shall flourish like the 
palm tree; he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon." 
Hundreds of metaphors and similes are employed to 
describe the beauty of religion. It is called a lily, a 
rose, a crown. It is a fountain to which the sun 
throws kisses of gold. It is a garden. It is a ban- 
quet of joy, a city perched upon a hill- 
top, a blaze of light pouring down from an 
unclouded sky, a bridegroom taking home his 
beloved bride. It is a prodigal returning to 
his father's house to be feasted. I cannot stop 
to name the many terms of description that set its 
beauty forth. Go search this blessed Book for your- 
selves, and you will have both hands full and all 



GREEN PASTURES 127 

the chambers of your heart and mind of sparkling 
rhetorical gems — richer gems than ever flashed in 
the coronet of a king. 

Oh, no ! Ours is not a repulsive religion. That is 
one of Satan's gray-haired lies. It is not a tooth- 
less witch, as the world portrays it, but a charming 
maiden, the blue of the heavens in her eyes, the gold 
of the sunshine in her tresses, the glow of the morn- 
ing upon her cheeks, the symmetry of an artist's 
dream upon her form, the gentleness of the south 
wind in her step. Come and pay court to her. The 
Holy Spirit says, "Come!" We who have found 
her beautiful say, "Come!" "Whosoever will, let 
him come!" 

I sometimes fear that Christian people talk too 
much about carrying a cross, and not enough about 
wearing a crown. But the Bible speaks more of 
crowns than it does of crosses. More sunlight than 
shadow. More blue skies than skies storm-tramped. 
More roses than thorns. Beautiful religion ! "Green 
pastures !" 

Why, it seems to me that the Christian life is more 
radiant every day. Each time I open my Bible I 
discover some new beauty. I used to wonder at the 
joy of some persons over their experience in spiritual 
things. But now I have ceased to wonder. Ask 
what religion is. Ask Paul and Silas in prison at 
Philippi, and they will answer with a song. Ask 
John in exile, and he will answer you with an Apoca- 
lypse. Ask Martin Luther, and he will answer you 



128 GREEN PASTURES 

with a Psalm of David. Ask John Bunyan, and he 
will answer you with a dream of heaven. There are 
thousands of witnesses. Ask them. I hear their 
voices to-day — voices out of pits, voices out of jails, 
voices out of fire, voices out of death-chambers, 
voices, voices, voices, and all of them saying, "Beau- 
tiful ! Beautiful !" "Green pastures." 

III. Once more, I remark, that we have here a 
suggestion in reference to the restfulness of a right- 
eous life. This is a picture of sheep that have had 
a generous supply of food. Now they are sunning 
themselves in the verdant mead that forms their 
pasture-ground. David knew all about it. He had 
seen his flocks in that attitude times without number. 
Then his thought rises to Him who shepherds the 
clouds, shepherds the sun and moon and stars, shep- 
herds the mountains, shepherds the waves of the 
sea, and who, in the exercise of His omnipotent 
love, also shepherds all the saints. "He maketh me 
to lie down in green pastures.'' 

Some one was once asked what he liked the best 
about this Twenty-third Psalm. His answer was, "I 
like best the personal pronouns in it. 'My shepherd/ 
'Maketh me to lie down.' 'Leadeth me.' 'Restoreth 
my soul.' It is a Psalm that every child of God can 
appropriate to himself." 

There is the point. David was resting under the 
bountifulness and the providence of God. His per- 
sonal experience of that abundance and constant care 
is for the saints of the Lord in every age — for you 



GREEN PASTURES 129 

and me. "He maketh me to lie down in green pas- 
tures." 

I have seen sheep driven to the shambles through 
the streets of cities. Those sheep dusty from their 
long tramp along country roads ; tired from running ; 
dogs barking at their heels. But not so with the 
Lord's sheep. God is not a drover, but a shepherd. 
He leads His sheep into green pastures. Shepherd 
for tender childhood. Shepherd for youth. Shep- 
herd for manhood, Shepherd for middle life. Shep- 
herd for trembling old age. Shepherd for the val- 
ley and the shadow of death. "Green pastures." 

"Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy 
laden, and I will give you rest." Why do you stay 
out, my friend, upon the barren heath of Satan's 
world ? Come and find rest for your soul in the green 
pastures of the Christian life. Out there is where 
swine feed. Why seek to appease your hunger with 
dry, juiceless, unsatisfying husks? Let the prodigal 
go home to his Father's house, his Father's out- 
stretched arms, his Father's welcoming kiss, his 
Father's sparkling ring, his Father's shoes for weary 
feet, his Father's rich banqueting board. Or keep- 
ing to the figure of the text, let the sheep that have 
wandered far away from the fold, and that now 
bleat their loneliness upon the frosty air of a mocking 
world, hear the voice of the Shepherd divine calling 
them, His voice music, His accents love; and let 
them go back to the pastures they have forsaken for 
a life of sin. Those pastures are beautiful with suc- 
9 



130 GREEN PASTURES 

culent grass, and are embroidered with clover and 
buttercups. There millions have found rest for the 
soul. Oh, what a blessed resti it is! A rest it is 
that is typical of the rest that remains above for all 
the blood-washed sheep of God. It is a foretaste of 
heavenly rest in pastures that never fail. Those pas- 
tures parch under no blasting heat. They never dry 
beneath blighting winds. They never wither below 
brassy skies. "For the Lamb which is in the midst 
of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them 
unto living fountains of waters, and God shall wipe 
away all tears from their eyes." Evergreen pastures ! 



Circles 

It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth. Isaiah 
40 : 22. 

In these sublime words the prophet speaks of God. 
No earthly monarch ever sat upon such a throne. 
The throne of an Artaxerxes, or Alexander, or Jul- 
ius Caesar placed beside this stupendous throne is but 
as the frothing foam of the ocean compared with the 
ocean itself, that foam left stranded along the beach 
by a dying breaker. The rest of the text declares 
that the inhabitants of the world are but grasshop- 
pers beneath this circle-throne. Only God could oc- 
cupy such a throne. 

The circle of the earth! That looks as if those 
ancient people knew something of the globular form 
of the world. There are lost arts. The Egyptians 
of the past ages embalmed the bodies of their dead 
with such skill as to make them as enduring as stone. 
In our museums there are Egyptian mummies that 
reveal the very features of persons whose souls took 
their flight from this world thousands of years ago. 
We pride ourselves upon our superior dentistry for 
the preservation of the teeth. Those same Egypti- 
ans practiced that art when the world was just out 
of its cradle, some of the mummies exhumed from 
the pyramids showing the gleam of gold within 



132 CIRCLES 

their parted lips. So it may be that in the bygone 
centuries the rotundity of the earth was as well 
known as it is to-day. The text intimates it when it 
says that God sits upon the earth's circle. 

The circle of the earth! What a throne! The 
clouds are the tessellated pavement around it. The 
sunbeams are its flashing steps. The blue sky is its 
canopy. The winds are the fans that sweep before 
it. Angelic courtiers are in attendance upon Him 
who sits in majesty upon that throne. It is the 
throne of God eternal in the heavens. 

I. I would remark, that the circle is God's favor- 
ite geometrical figure. He uses either the circle or 
parts of the circle, as curves, which are circles in 
their infancy. The sun is a circle on fire. The moon 
is a frozen circle. The stars are silvery circles, the 
telescope revealing their spherical shape. The earth 
is a circle. Our world revolves around the sun in an 
elliptical orbit, an ellipse being a circle pressed in at 
the sides and elongated into oval form. The revo- 
lutions of other planets are along the same kind of 
lines. There is a theory of science that this whole 
universe is thus circling around some vast central 
point. It is not an unreasonable theory. Just like 
God would it be to have matters so arranged. In 
connection with this theory is one that makes this 
one central, stationary point to be heaven. Neither 
is this unreasonable. 

Narrowing our vision, we find but few angles. 
But there are plenty of curves. Witness the rain- 



CIRCLES 133 

bow that banners the heights of a retreating storm. 
Witness the rolling waves of the ocean, and the curl- 
ing breakers that rush to their death in spray upon 
the strand. Witness the raindrops that drum the 
march of the harvests. Witness the rounding of a 
snowdrift under the mallet and chisel of the north 
wind. Witness the outline of a bird's wing, whether 
wren or albatross. Witness the flowers, whether a 
dandelion or a century plant. Witness the human 
form, whether male or female; man's trunk an in- 
verted cone, woman's trunk a cone; so that man, 
instead of being the lord of creation is only a woman 
reversed. Witness hundreds of things that I have 
not the time to mention — God moving His hand in 
circles when He called the heavens into existence; 
and His hand yet describing circles in the operation 
of natural law. We need not therefore be surprised 
that God sitteth upon the circle of the earth. That 
circle is a symbol of His eternity, which is a com- 
pleted circle, being without beginning or end. 

II. I would remark, again, that human life moves 
in a circle. The beginning of that circle, as the pen- 
cil of time draws it, is the cradle; the grave is the 
point where the rounded line is joined to the first 
stroke. It may be a large circle or a small circle, 
sweeping far up into the years before it descends 
along the downward curve and around to the bot- 
tom arc, or going but a short distance and then fin- 
ishing. But large or small, the first breath of life 
and the last dying gasp meet each other. Birth and 



134 CIRCLES 

death always come together. We are born only to die. 
This circular movement of life is often well 
marked, especially when the circle is prolonged. The 
only difference between childhood and adult years 
is that the play of the one is merged into the work 
of the other. The games and pastimes of boys and 
girls are a foreshadowing of later toils and cares. 
The dolls of early girlhood are hints of future nur- 
series ; and the pretended solicitude that brings those 
dolls through severe cases of imaginary mumps and 
measles and scarlet fever is the sweet prelude to an 
after-discord, anxiety that is real then fingering the 
keys of the organ, and nervousness treading the 
pedals. The picnic meals under summer trees are 
types of meals under domestic roofs in monotonous 
succession three times a day through a period of 
years. The engineer of to-day, with his hand on the 
throttle of his wind-racing steed, when he was a boy 
often made believe that he was driving a locomotive. 
The doctor on his rounds once dealt in sugar pills 
and water tinctures. The minister in his pulpit 
more than one time preached to an audience of 
chairs. The carpenter at his bench used to plane 
with a flat block and pound with a stove-lifter. The 
banker and the merchant wrote checks without ink 
and passed bills made of newspapers. It is life in a 
circle, the sports of the morning becoming the trade 
or profession of the afternoon ; and when evening is 
at hand, and the circle moves on into old age, sec- 
ond childhood comes into view, and death is not far 



CIRCLES 135 

away. Grandfather and grandmother live over again 
their youthful days in the lives of their children's 
children. That is why grandparents are often more 
lenient with children than are the parents themselves. 
They have gone almost all the way around the circle 
and reached again the spirit of childhood. Soon af- 
terwards they are undressed for the night by the 
black nurse, Death, and their bodies put to sleep un- 
der the flower-embroidered coverlet of the grave. 

But from the death-bed another circle sweeps. The 
spirit is immortal. It goes forth to fly around the 
great circle of eternity. Years on earth, though they 
be fourscore, are but microscopic objects in eternity. 
We make several respirations in a minute, and in a 
lifetime of ordinary length these respirations become 
incalculable in number; but all of them together, 
condensed into moisture, would not make a single 
dewdrop in comparison with the waters of eternity's 
ocean. Even centuries and millenniums are but 
single grains of sand in the glass that measures the 
hours of eternity. 

Is it a depressing thought or a jubilant thought, 
that you and I are passing around this little circle of 
life in preparation for the wider journey around the 
circle of immortality? It depends upon whether or 
not our life here is hid with Christ in God. Covered 
by atoning blood, that thought should rouse up 
within the soul the most joyous anticipations, like a 
prospective trip to another continent. Growing old 
is growing young. The whitening of the hair at 



136 CIRCLES 

the temples is not the gathering of a snowdrift, but 
the light of eternal youth beginning to dawn. Death 
will introduce us to endless life in heaven. 

But if we are going to the grave with rebellion 
against God burning within the heart, then we may 
well shudder at the thought of relaxing our grip 
upon this present life. "After death the judgment." 
Heaven is a circle of happiness; hell is a circle of 
misery. Man, woman, child, where are you going? 
Answer that question to-day before Him who sitteth 
upon the circle of the earth. 

III. I would remark, again, that the rewards and 
penalties of Him who sitteth upon the circle of the 
earth complete circles of well-doing and wickedness. 
In other words, the providence of God moves in a 
circle. 

Joseph is the favorite son of Jacob's household. 
That circle of parental favoritism sweeps on until its 
top arc is above a king's throne, becoming royal fa- 
voritism; thence it curves downward to the meeting 
of father and son in Egypt, and completes the circle 
of love. God would not let the righteousness of that 
boy go unrewarded. What mattered it that the curv- 
ing line that started away from Jacob's tent paused 
at a hole in the pasture lands of Dothan? What 
mattered it that it paused again at Potiphar's prison 
in a strange land after it had swept around an hon- 
ored slavery? What mattered it that it again paused 
at Pharaoh's palace, there shining with regal splen- 
dor? God's hand held the pencil, and God knows 



CIRCLES 137 

how to draw a circle. Jacob often fancied that he 
heard the wild beasts rending the body of his beloved 
son; but at last he heard the rumble of the king's 
wagons, those wagons bringing him news of the lost 
one, the tidings so disturbing the action of the old 
father's heart that he fainted away, but afterwards 
reviving, and in his old age making pilgrimage to the 
home and heart of Joseph. 

Job is introduced to us as a man of wealth, having 
not only many possessions, but also many sons and 
daughters. A little farther on the line of the circle 
encloses poverty, bereavement, disease. But it does 
not stop at that point. Still onward it goes, and 
comes back to where it started. Job is again rich in 
houses and lands and cattle, and again rich in 
children, and again rich in health. When God 
draws a circle it is always a perfect circle. 

Paul begins his Christian life as a missionary to 
the Gentiles. It was his ambition to preach the Gos- 
pel in the city of Rome. God takes him around a 
circuitous route. The line runs from one point to 
another. It was a wide circle, but God drew it. What 
mattered it that its line was so far-reaching in its 
course? What mattered it that it came around at 
last to martyrdom ? The hand of God was sweeping 
it on to the gates of pearl and the coronation of 
heaven. 

Thus might I continue with illustrations of the 
fact that God uses the figure of the circle in reward- 
ing His servants. But enough for us to know the 



138 CIRCLES 

fact itself. Let its radiance come down into the 
griefs and disappointments and darkness of your life 
and mine. We may not have sufficient strength of 
vision to follow the majestic sweep of God's curves, 
but we can trust in His geometrical skill and exact- 
ness. The day will come when we shall know that 
all things wrought together for our good. From the 
commanding view-point of eternity the providences 
of God will have a different look from what they ap- 
peared to be in time. No angles then, but perfect 
circles. The crowns that we shall wear will be un- 
fading circles. 

But there is another side to this subject. Evil 
runs in a circle. Ahab wanted Naboth's vineyard. 
He murdered Naboth, taking the vineyard by foul 
means, not being able to secure it through fair 
means. In the place where the dogs licked Na- 
both's blood, the dogs licked Ahab's blood. 
It was a circle of crime and punishment, drawn by 
Him who sitteth upon the circle of the earth. 

Pilate and Christ stand facing each other in the 
judgment hall of the Roman governor; Christ and 
Pilate will stand facing each other in the judgment 
hall of eternity on the last day. 

Sometimes this circle of punishment has a larger 
curve than at other times; but whatever the sweep 
of the line, it always comes back to the starting 
point. The hand that draws that circle and the eye 
that guides the moving hand are both unerring. "Be 
sure your sin will find you out." 



CIRCLES 139 

A man holds in his grasp his first glass of liquor. 
At the bottom of that glass a serpent is coiled in circ- 
ling folds of poison, that coiled serpent typical of 
the circle of intoxication in its progressiveness, the 
curve sweeping on from the first glass to the second, 
and the third, and the fourth, and dozens and scores 
and hundreds, describing a rounded line of debauch- 
ery that winds on to a drunkard's grave and a drunk- 
ard's hell, unless by the grace of God that circle be 
broken. Around that circle is another circle, en- 
closing the legislators that licensed the saloon in 
which the man began his downward career, and en- 
closing the distiller who manufactured the contents 
of the glass, and enclosing the wholesaler that sold 
the vile stuff to the retailer, and enclosing the one 
who passed the glass over the bar, and enclosing 
the owner of the property in which the liquor was 
dispensed, and enclosing the honorable gentlemen 
who furthered the sale of the hell-broth in the use of 
their signatures, those signatures giving permission 
to destroy manhood ; to blast the roses in the cheeks 
of womanhood ; to hang rags upon the back of child- 
hood; and to balk all morality and all religion — that 
circle running on and on, God only knows where; 
for I cannot trace that circle around the whole sweep 
of responsibility for the ruination of a human soul 
by drink. But glad I am that my hands are not hold- 
ing any part of that fearful line. Are yours? Let 
each one answer for himself before Him that sitteth 
upon the circle of the earth. 



140 CIRCLES 

What a tremendously startling thought that is, 
that sin and judgment will surely meet! How care- 
ful it should make us with our deeds, with our 
speech, with our feelings, causing us to be honest 
and truthful and loving! How it should lead us to 
God and His mercy, and keep us within sight of the 
Cross of Jesus Christ! 

There will be circles described in the world's final 
scene of trial. Sweeping His hand in circle of ges- 
ture, Christ will say to those gathered on His right 
side, "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the 
kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of 
the world." Sweeping His hand in circle of gesture 
again, Christ will say to those gathered on His left 
side, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting 
fire prepared for the devil and his angels." And 
those on the right will turn and circle into glory; 
those on the left will turn and circle into darkness. 
Two circles at the judgment. Which one will your 
feet draw? 

IV. I remark, once more, that in the circle of 
God's plan of salvation there is no provision made for 
defeat. The world started with a garden; heaven 
will be an everlasting garden. Into that first garden 
came sin; but for sin God gave the Saviour; so that 
the line of the circle curved onward to the Cross of 
Christ; thence it still curves onward, until the para- 
dise lost becomes the paradise regained. The Cross 
of that almighty Saviour is standing midway between 
the two gardens, one garden looking at it from one 



CIRCLES 141 

side, the other garden forever looking at it from the 
other side. Within that circle of redemption are 
gathered the uncounted multitudes of all the ages yet 
to come. Sin thought to mar and hinder the purpose 
of God, but it left out of its calculation of evil the 
fact of the Cross. What a wonderful circle! It is 
the circle of God's love. 

In the Apocalypse John gives us a glimpse of God's 
throne. That throne is seen to be circled by a rain- 
bow. We never see a rainbow in its fulness. A 
complete rainbow is a physical impossibility in the 
skies of the earth. But around God's throne the 
seer of Patmos beheld a whole rainbow — a circle of 
iridescent light. Suggestive is that of God's un- 
broken plan revealed. Now we catch only partial 
views of that plan here and there. We see it in frag- 
ments. But in eternity all limitations shall be re- 
moved. We shall, at least, be much better capable 
of judging God's purposes, for we shall look at them 
from the right point of observation. In that sense, 
if not in others, shall our present limitations be re- 
moved. Then the whole rainbow — a full circle. 

We need not, therefore, vex ourselves with the 
metaphysical question, Why did God let sin come 
into the world? Suffice it to know that God could 
not be defeated by the presence or the power of sin. 
It is our business, being sinners by choice, to avail 
ourselves of God's grace, and thus pass from con- 
demnation to acceptance through the precious blood 
of Jesus Christ, which blood cleanseth from all sin. 



142 CIRCLES 

But now I see another circle. The Cross of Christ, 
while it was in the plan of God, was reared by hu- 
man hate and wickedness. Christ was crowned with 
thorns. But around that Cross moves the line of a 
circle, and beside the Cross is a throne. Who sits 
upon that throne? He who wore the crown of 
thorns. All heaven worships Him, standing around 
His blazing throne in circling ranks of glory — circle 
of the redeemed in white robes; circle of symbolical 
living creatures; circle of angels — these circles of 
splendor within circles of splendor; all of them sur- 
rounding the throne of Christ ; His throne, therefore, 
the centre of a trinity of lustrous circumferences. 
When that coronation scene arrives, it will be the last 
drawing of the circle of God's eternal plan. As the 
shining pencil drops from the fingers of Him whose 
name is Love, the completed circle will be a trium- 
phant answer to all infidelity. Christ forever on the 
throne! This in vindication of the wisdom and 
goodness of God! Sin everlastingly repulsed! A 
magnificent circle of divine victory! 



Riddles Musically Interpreted 

I will open my dark saying upon the harp. Ps. 49 : 4. 

The Emperor Nero played a fiddle while Rome 
was burning. He was a devil in human flesh who 
was capable of any crime. The man who could poi- 
son the members of his family with less compunction 
of conscience or revulsion of feeling than you and I 
could poison a rat was equal to anything wicked. 
The wonder is that, during the conflagration of the 
imperial city, that conflagration started by his own 
hand, he did not lead a whole orchestra in music, in- 
stead of simply playing on a fiddle unaccompanied. 

But here is a man in an entirely different atti- 
tude. He is about to use his harp in the interpreta- 
tion of a moral riddle. The Psalmist, instead of 
fiendishly rejoicing over calamity and trouble, is 
ready to strike the strings of his instrument and 
soothe all woe and distress with the harmonies of 
faith. Listen to him! "I will open my dark saying 
upon the harp." 

Human life is an interrogation point. There are 
many things after which you and I and all our fel- 
low-beings put a question mark. That question 
mark follows sin, follows sickness, follows disap- 
pointment, follows death. We can hardly go in 
any direction along life's path without coming in 



144 RIDDLES INTERPRETED 

contact with what is mysterious and inexplicable. 
Experience is a stern school master who is ever plac- 
ing on the blackboard of life sums that we cannot 
work out and get the right answer. 

But the Psalmist declares that the riddles of life 
can be musically interpreted. He takes down his 
harp and expounds these enigmas that are common 
to us all, expounding them in tuneful vibrations. It 
is not merely an intellectual exposition that is given. 
Man is a wonderful creature in brain development. 
His brain is a spark out of God's brain. He can 
throw the light of reason over many a problem and 
make it clear. With scientific apparatus he can not 
only measure the mountains of earth, but also meas- 
ure far-distant planets and suns. Taking his alpine 
stock of telescope in hand, he can travel from star to 
star, stepping from world to world in a single night. 
Yet there are some things that are beyond him. 
There are many secrets that he cannot discover. 
Hundreds of treasures of knowledge there are to 
which he has no opening key. These are God's 
providences. But though he may not be able to 
give any satisfactory philosophical explanation of the 
government of God, he can sing about it. The Psalm- 
ist's exposition of trouble, therefore, is of the heart. 
He sets the insoluble dealings of the Lord to music. 
That is better than sulking because they cannot be 
understood. Let us imitate him in this matter, glanc- 
ing at a few of life's more prominent mysteries, and 
then opening them in melodies of trust. 



RIDDLES INTERPRETED 145 

I. The very first question we ask is one in regard 
to the fact of human sin. Why did God let sin come 
into the world? That is an old question. It has 
trembled pathetically upon millions of lips. It has 
written itself in tears upon millions of cheeks. 
It has traced itself in wrinkles along mil- 
lions of brows. It has come forth into the 
air in long-drawn sighs from millions of hearts. 
Yea; that question has traveled over sixty centuries 
of time, starting on the journey with erect form, but 
gradually bowing its head, like a man growing aged, 
until it assumed the shape of an interrogation point, 
as we know that point in these modern days. It is a 
veritable patriarch among inquiries. 

There are those who attempt to answer that ques- 
tion. "Oh," they say, "that is easy. Give us some- 
thing harder." These smart ones are in the first form 
in the school of life, at the head of the class. With 
overweening conceit they tell those of us who are 
farther down in the list of scholarship that sin is a 
necessary evil. Perhaps it is. But where did they 
ascertain the truth ? In what text book did they find 
it? That is what sin seems to be. But what I want 
is fact, not theory. The fact that I am after is not in 
the Bible. The Scriptures do not explain the mys- 
tery. They simply tell of the coming of sin into the 
world and narrate its progress over the world. 
Why God did not build around Eden a wall so high 
that sin could not climb it is a question that is left 
in the dark. That dark is the dark of a midnight 
10 



146 RIDDLES INTERPRETED 

without stars. It is bounded on all sides and above 
by an impenetrable gloom. 

There are others who declare that God could not 
prevent sin. That is a bolder step. It is too bold for 
me. My intellectual legs are not long enough to 
take a stride like that. If God could not prevent 
sin, then He is not God. That solution of the mys- 
tery is more puzzling than the mystery itself. It dis- 
crowns God, snaps His sceptre in twain, and rocks 
His throne into the dust. When He made the world, 
and rolled it forth as a new gem in the clusters of 
worlds that sparkle on the bosom of space, He was 
omnipotent; but when sin breathed upon that fair 
jewel the breath of hell, and marred its lustre, God 
was nothing more than a Napoleon meeting his 
Waterloo. No, no ! I cannot accept that solution of 
the problem. It does not give the proper result. The 
figuring is wrong. I take off my hat and bid you 
good-night, gentlemen. My face is toward the sun- 
rise. 

There are others who affirm that God is indifferent 
towards sin. That is even a bolder step still, and re- 
quiring a much longer stride. If I were to attempt to 
walk with these, I should stumble over the precipice 
of infidelity and be dashed to pieces upon the rocks 
of absolute atheism. But you and I know better, or 
else the Bible is a fraud made up of sixty-six vol- 
umes — a whole library of lies. God indifferent to- 
wards sin? What then is the meaning of that won- 
derfully pathetic picture of God seeking His erring 



RIDDLES INTERPRETED 147 

children among the trees of Paradise ? What means 
that sobbing query, "Adam, where art thou?" That 
picture has been reproduced on a smaller scale in 
unnumbered lives ; and that tearful question has been 
more than a million times repeated by agonized pa- 
rental lips, inspiring such weeping songs as, 

"Where is my wandering boy to-night — 
The boy of my tenderest care, 
The boy that was once my joy and light, 
The child of my love and prayer?" 

Is there a father's heart or a mother's heart that 
does not know something of the pain that took hold 
of the heart of God when sin stung the innocence of 
the first man and woman of creation ? God indiffer- 
ent towards sin? Impossible! Do you wish an un- 
answerable argument against so monstrous a dogma 
as that ? Follow that initial sin of the world ; follow 
it as it engenders more sin; follow it through the 
darkness of antediluvian days; follow it through the 
nettles of adultery; follow it through the wilderness 
of murder; follow it through the jungles of idolatry; 
follow it through the slime pits of the most stenchful 
uncleanness ; follow it across four thousand years of 
time. Halt ! What is that yonder ? A Cross ! What 
means it ? Look ! Behold its sunbeam inscription ! 
"God so loved the world !" Taking one arm of that 
Cross as a lever, I pry this rock of blasphemy, that 
God is indifferent towards sin, out of its place, and 



148 RIDDLES INTERPRETED 

send it rolling into the depths of hell! Listen to its 
far-away fall! Crash! 

No human brain knows why God let sin come into 
the world. It is doubtful that any angelic brain 
knows. For some inscrutable reason it has God's 
permission. Like a great, ugly, black cloud of mid- 
night, it has come into being, and spread itself over 
the sky of human life — over Europe ; over Asia ; over 
Africa ; over America. But instead of seeking to dis- 
solve that awful darkness, let us patiently wait for 
the triumphant light to burst through the gloom, 
adjourning the query until the morning of the Resur- 
rection. Let us open this dark saying upon the 
harp of faith, and sing of God's redeeming love. 

At this point I will tell you what is my own 
thought about why God let sin come into the world. 
It is not original with me. I came upon it in my 
reading upon this subject; and I adopted it as a most 
comfortable theory. That thought is that God per- 
mitted human sin as a preventive of sin in other 
worlds. We are not to suppose that this is the only 
inhabited earth of the universe. It would not be 
like God, reasoning from analogy, to let this earth be 
the only world-train carrying passengers through the 
immensity of space. There must be other orbs, and 
many of them, that are peopled. It may be that God 
allowed sin here, in this insignificant corner of crea- 
tion, to spit forth its venom, in order that other 
worlds, grander worlds, mightier worlds, more 
stupendous worlds, might learn the terrible 



RIDDLES INTERPRETED 149 

story, that story requiring the infinite blood 
of an infinite Saviour to wipe it out, and 
those worlds be powerfully deterred from 
plunging into a like folly. That is deep water, I ad- 
mit. But I have gone swimming in it, and come 
back to the shore refreshed and invigorated. Yet, 
whether this be the solution of the mystery or not, I 
open my harp this morning, the harp of faith in God, 
a faith that grows with the passing years, and upon 
that harp I strike this exultant chord: "Where sin 
abounded, grace did much more abound !" 

II. Another question we ask is in regard to vari- 
ous forms of trouble. In so bright a world as this 
why should there be any trouble ? Why are the flow- 
ers in life's garden so often blighted by the frosts 
of disappointment? Why are the plans that are so 
often built up into seemingly solid structures of 
achievement likewise often thrown down flat in the 
dust by earthquakes of adversity? Why are smiles 
in sunbeams along the lips so often darkened and 
chased away by grief, the heart brewing a thunder- 
storm that sends a rain of tears down the cheeks? 
Here again is sin. We can readily understand that 
sin is responsible for the many woes of mankind. If 
that shadow had not spread its black wings over 
Eden, there would have been no other black-winged 
shadows to follow. Sin has written greater trage- 
dies than ever came from the pen of a Shakespeare. 

But when we place a question mark after the 
troubles that befall the children of God, the answer to 



150 RIDDLES INTERPRETED 

the inquiry is not so apparent. Why not keep trouble 
out of a godly life? Why not have every morning 
roseate with an unclouded sunrise, and every evening 
golden and purple with an unclouded sunset? Why 
not have all the day in between the morning and 
evening overarched with an unclouded sky of blue? 
Why these oft-recurring sicknesses that make many 
prisoners in their own homes? Why these agitated 
nerves? Why do fiery feet of pain go traveling 
through the head and down the muscles of the trunk 
and limbs? Why these financial losses? Why these 
losses of good position? Why these losses of fa- 
vorable opportunity? Why? Why? Why? A 
lady once said to me, "There is no word that I oft- 
ener use than the word Why?" We all frequently 
use it. There is no word in our vocabulary that 
comes oftener upon the lips. It is not a singing 
word at all. It weeps and sighs. Why does not God 
brush it from every Christian tongue, filling the 
throat with laughter? 

Well, the Psalmist had been all through this dif- 
ficulty of trouble. Instead of impugning the love 
and wisdom of God, he has grasped the truth that 
God reigns; and that He overrules all sorrow with 
good. This is the dark saying or riddle that he 
opens upon his harp. He floods the providences of 
God with music. 

That is what you and I should do. We should 
take our harps down from the willows and thrum 
their silent melodies into glad sounds. How can 



RIDDLES INTERPRETED 151 

you do that? How did Job do it? Have you ever 
been so sorely afflicted as he was? Listen to that 
boil-covered, poverty-stricken, childless man. He 
has sent a strain of music trembling through all the 
ages. Listen! "Though he slay me, yet will I trust 
him." How did Paul do it? Were you ever troubled 
as he was? Read his epistles. They are portfolios 
of music. You can turn no page without coming 
upon notes that are vibrant with joy. 

I make no pretence of solving the providences of 
God. But I can see what appear to be some of the 
reasons for God's sharpness of dealing with His 
children. One of these reasons, I think, is that we 
may have our hearts made tender and sympathetic. 
Woe to those who are hardened or soured by trouble ! 
Who are those who listen with moist eyes as you tell 
them of sorrow ? Who are those who have a quiver 
in their voice when they speak of sorrow? Who are 
those who have great kindness of manner when they 
come in contact with sorrow? These are those who 
have taken a full course in the college of sorrow, en- 
tering the freshman class, and going clear up to the 
senior class, from there graduating with a diploma 
signed by the whole faculty of trouble. What they 
have themselves suffered ! Do you know what made 
Washington Irving a master of pathetic writing? 
It was an early loss of love that he kept in the casket 
of memory, locked up there, far too precious for the 
vulgar gaze of the world. That love was the love of 
his sweetheart, Matilda Hoffman, whose beautiful 



152 RIDDLES INTERPRETED 

face was shut out from his sight by a coffin-lid, 
Washington Irving remaining all his life a bachelor. 
He dipped his pen into his own tearful experience, 
thus making his books world-wide favorites. 

Yes; we need to feel the hand of trouble to make 
us sympathetic. A rough teacher in a school room, 
about to punish one of the pupils who had broken 
the rules, said to the boy, "Take off your coat !" The 
boy refused to obey. He was a poor, half-starved 
lad. Again said the teacher, "Take off your coat!" 
swinging his whip in a threatening manner through 
the air. The boy still refused. Why? He was not 
afraid of punishment. He had plenty of that at 
home. The reason was that he had no undergarment 
on, so poor were his parents, and he was ashamed 
to show his poverty. But at the third command 
from the teacher the lad slowly and reluctantly pulled 
off his coat, and the whole school room was thrown 
into sobs and tears, for it was seen that the boy's 
back was bare, and his sharp shoulder blades had al- 
most cut through the skin. Then a stout, healthy 
boy rose up and said, "Oh, sir! please don't whip 
this poor fellow ; whip me ! Don't you see how thin 
he is? Whip me!" 

That is the kind of sympathy that many need. They 
get it through the discipline of sorrow. Then the 
sight of suffering in others appeals to their heart. 

So does the discipline of sorrow quicken our 
Christian graces. What kind of a man would Paul 
have been, if he had never had a rough, thorny path 



RIDDLES INTERPRETED 153 

spread out to his feet? We do not know. But this 
we do know; that he was a better man because he 
traveled a hard road. So with David. So with thou- 
sands of other saints. The winds of sorrow may be 
rude musicians to finger spiritual seolian harps, but 
they evoke wondrous strains. These harmonious 
chords that freight the air down here are but the 
prelude of celestial symphonies. The full orches- 
tration is yet to burst and thrill. 

III. Another interrogation point placed over life 
is that of bereavement and death. Why these early 
graves out in the churchyard and cemetery? Why 
are so many of the young and promising stricken 
down and their usefulness ended? Why these con- 
stantly-breaking family ties? Why swathe so many 
doorbells with crepe? Why halt so many hearses at 
the threshold of the home? But God knows why. 
I do not intend to question His acts. If there is any 
music in bereavement, I am going to strike it. Is 
there any? Yes! Listen! It comes from a distant 
land and a distant age. "The Lord gave, and the 
Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the 
Lord !" Those were the harpnotes of a man who lost 
seven sons and three daughters at one swoop of the 
black wings and fierce talons of death. If he could 
open a dark saying upon a harp under that ten- 
fisted bereavement, surely we can finger the harp of 
trust in God when our dear ones go singly home. 

So is the fact of death for ourselves a fact for 
questionings. How many hearts there are that fear 



154 RIDDLES INTERPRETED 

death! We go to funerals and see flowers banked 
around the still form in the casket, and flowers upon 
the coffin lid, as the mournful procession follows to the 
cemetery, and flowers strewn over the new grave that 
closes upon the body of the departed one; but the 
flowers cannot hide the repulsiveness of death. 

It is said that Professor Darwin was accustomed 
to visit the London Zoological Gardens and stand 
beside a glass case containing a cobra, the most poi- 
sonous of serpents. He would place his forehead 
against the glass, each time that he did so the ven- 
omous reptile striking at him. There was heavy 
glass between them, the man of science well knowing 
that he could not be harmed ; yet, whenever the snake 
sprang at him, the professor would dodge. He tried 
it again and again, each time shrinking as before, his* 
instinct overpowering his will and reason. 

So may you and I be instinctively afraid of death; 
but down in our very heart of hearts we 
know full well that it cannot do us any 
hurt. Therefore, even in our fear may we 
open this dark riddle upon a harp, accom- 
panying a song of triumph. Between every 
Christian soul and death is the unsealed grave of 
Him who is the Resurrection and the Life. You and 
I may go to the tomb with this hallelujah: "O death, 
where is thy sting?" That music is yet to break into 
the oratorio of heaven, preluded by the resounding 
notes of the last trump. God grant that every one 
of us may have a share in that songful victory ! 



Christianity vs. Worldliness 

Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separ- 
ate, saith the Lord. II Cor. 6: 17. 

Every word in that sentence is emphatic. But 
the emphasis rises into a climax. The sentence starts 
on the level and ends in a mountain peak. The 
mountain peak flames with the presence of God and 
shakes with the thunder of God's voice. We are 
standing before another Sinai. Listen ! "Thus saith 
the Lord!" 

I am glad that Paul put this important matter in 
that form. He speaks with divine authority. There 
cannot be the slightest doubt about his inspiration. 
His utterance bears the stamp of divinity. The 
coin that he circulates was not minted in his own 
brain. It was not counterfeit. What he says is what 
God Himself says. Hear the text again. "Where- 
fore come out from among them, and be ye sep- 
arate, saith the Lord." 

Paul was inspired in all of his writings. We must 
not forget that fact. But lest he should be accused 
of here giving only his own thought, or simply in- 
dulging an orator's taste for rhetoric, he dissipates 
any fog that gathers around his words with a sun- 
burst— "Saith the Lord!" That settles the matter. 
He has taken it into the Supreme Court for decision. 



156 CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 

Against the opinion rendered there can be no appeaL 
What God says cannot be set aside. This is no spi- 
der web to be brushed away with the broom of hu- 
man reasoning. It is one of the massive pillars in the 
great temple of Christian truth. Those who would 
remove that pillar would bring the whole majestic 
edifice crashing to the ground. 

This passage starts in my mind two inquiries. The 
first one is, What is the exact import of the text? 
The second one is, What is the application of the 
text to the present time? 

I. What is the exact import of the text? Paul 
himself solves the query in the context. His lan- 
guage is unmistakable. He tells those Corinthian 
Christians to whom he writes that their profession of 
the religion of Jesus Christ should draw a sharp 
dividing line between them and the idolatrous 
world by which they are surrounded. It must be 
like the line of demarcation between healthy flesh and 
flesh that is gangrened. He does not beat around 
the bush. There are no qualifying phrases in his 
language. He does not mince matters. Listen! 
"Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbeliev- 
ers; for what fellowship hath righteousness with un- 
righteousness? And what communion hath light 
with darkness ? And what concord hath Christ with 
Belial ? Or what part hath he that believeth with an 
infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of 
God with idols? For ye are the temple of the liv- 
ing God; as God hath said, "I will dwell in them 



CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 157 

and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they 
shall be my people. Wherefore come out from 
among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and 
touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive 
you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be 
my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." 
This is one of the most tremendous paragraphs in 
the New Testament. There is the weight of moun- 
tains in it. There is in it the emphasis of a whirl- 
wind. What does it mean? It seems unnecessary 
to ask such a question. It means just what it says. 
Analyze it, take it apart, put it under the microscope 
of minute criticism, place it on the rack of torture, 
do what you will with it, and you cannot make it 
anything less than a clear, clean-cut, straight, posi- 
tive command to the Christian to turn a cold shoul- 
der to the great evil world that is opposed to him and 
his regenerated life. To strike friendly hands 
with that world is to discard the yoke of 
Christ and work in a yoke that galls. It 
is to intermingle light and darkness. It is 
to make Christianity and wickedness harmonious. 
It is to pollute the sacred precincts of a divine tem- 
ple with idols. Such things those Corinthian Chris- 
tians must not even think of doing. "Wherefore 
come out from among them, and be ye separate." 
So commands the Apostle in the name of God. That 
there can be no mistaking his authority in the matter, 
he adds, "saith the Lord." At the end of the whole 
paragraph he adds, "saith the Lord Almighty." That 



158 CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 

makes the command doubly emphatic. It is two 
trumpet peals in succession, the last one closely fol- 
lowing the first, and with increased sound. "Saith 
the Lord !" "Saith the Lord Almighty." From the 
final blast is rolled one of God's attributes. When 
something breaks upon the ear as coming from God, 
it is well to consider it. When it comes again, 
charged with God's omnipotence, it is well to give it 
more earnest heed. That is a lightning flash and its 
accompanying voice of thunder. 

Now, do you suppose that those Corinthian Chris- 
tians failed to understand what their pastor was 
driving at? If so, then they must have been dul- 
lards of a very pronounced type. There would have 
been more dunces' heads in that school than dunce 
caps to fit them. In fact, it would have been neces- 
sary to turn the school into an asylum for imbecility. 
Those who could not comprehend the words of this 
Christian teacher could not comprehend anything. 
They would have been hopeless idiots. The Apos- 
tle's words might as well have faded from the parch- 
ment as soon as they were written. He could not 
have put the matter more simply or strongly. And 
if he did not intend to instill into the minds of that 
people the idea that they must be entirely different 
from what they were before they began the Chris- 
tian life, then Paul was doing nothing more than 
juggling with words. But those to whom he was 
writing knew what he was writing about. They ac- 
cepted his command, for it was backed by an unques- 



CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 159 

tioned inspiration. Paul was too serious a man to 
play with language. The text was a direct, distinct, 
decided summons to those Corinthian Christians to 
have no compromising connection with anything in 
the world that was foreign or obnoxious to the holi- 
ness of God. They were to make a clean sweep of 
worldliness in all its forms from their hearts. Not 
a single cobweb must be left hanging from the ceil- 
ing. Not a single speck of dust must be left griming 
the walls. Not a single stain of dirt must be left to 
smirch the floor. "Come out from among them, and 
be ye separate, saith the Lord." This, and only this, 
is the exact import of the text — the unconditional 
surrender of worldliness. 

II. What is the application of the text to the pres- 
ent time ? This is to be the main part of my sermon. 
Give me your most earnest attention. May the Lord 
help me to speak aright ! 

Now, then, if in Paul's day it was necessary for 
Christians to be separate from the world, the same 
necessity exists in our day. It is the very same 
world, with the very same sins clinging to it, with the 
very same vices practiced by it, and with the very 
same boldness of hatred against everything that is 
pure and good and holy. It is the foe of God. 

When I say the world, I do not, of course, mean 
the physical world. That world I love. Its moun- 
tains preach to me of God. Its winds whisper to 
me of God. Its oceans are to me the glistening path- 
ways on which walk the feet of God. The skies that 



160 CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 

bend over it are God's picture gallery wherein He ex- 
hibits His marvelous paintings of sunrise and sun- 
set, and along which He hangs His matchless draw- 
ings of cloud in frame of blue, or in ebony frame of 
storm gilded with lightning. Those same skies at 
night are God's book of poems, every star and every 
galaxy and every constellation God's glowing rhetoric 
unfolded to the vision, bringing to view the wonder- 
ful measures that His infinite mind expresses in sil- 
very planets and blazing suns and whole concourses 
of grandeur gathered into the Milky Way. Beauti- 
ful world! Handsome world! Glorious world! It 
is one of God's fairest jewels among millions of 
sparkling gems. I have often looked at this world 
when I have been entranced by its splendor, at such 
times of exalted mood wondering if heaven itself 
could be more lustrous than it. Lift from it the 
foul touch of human sin, and it would become the 
suburbs of the celestial city. That is what it was 
when God first sent it rolling into space as the home 
of mankind. That is what it shall be again after the 
second Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ, shall have 
drawn to His magnetic Cross all that the Father 
promised Him should be the subjects of His ever- 
lasting kingdom. God speed the day ! 

No, it is not of the physical world that I speak, 
but of the moral world — the world that is multiplied 
in human hearts in rebellion against God; the world 
that openly defies the righteous laws of God; the 
world that draws its inspiration for evil deeds from 



CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 161 

the smoky depths of perdition; the world that is in- 
fluenced and determined and governed by sin. This 
it is that is the very same world to-day that was in 
Paul's day. The march of centuries over it has not 
changed it one particle. The sweep of revolutions 
has not in the least altered it. The downfall of an- 
cient empires and the rising of new thrones have not 
disturbed it in its course of wickedness. It remains 
the same implacable enemy of God that it ever was. 
To God it has been infernally antagonistic from al- 
most the first stroke of time ; and so will it continue 
to be until the pendulum halts and stands still, when 
God shall smite it with everlasting death and bury it 
hell-deep in a grave of everlasting darkness. 

It is against those who are enslaved by sin in such 
a world that the Apostle speaks when he warns Chris- 
tians to "come out from among them and be separ- 
ate." As in his day there could be no fellowship be- 
tween that world and those who had been born anew 
into a spiritual world, so now can there be no such 
companionship or alliance. As well attempt to bring 
the North and the South poles together. As well at- 
tempt to raise pansies upon an iceberg. As well at- 
tempt to harness a snail with a race-horse. Those 
two worlds are diametrically opposed to each other. 
You can no more bring them into harmonious union 
than you could make the gates of hell the entrance 
into heaven. 

I am by no means inclined to suppress all mirth 
and pleasure. I do not class myself with those who 
ii 



162 CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 

condemn smiles and praise groans and tears. I have 
not the least sympathy with a long-faced Christianity 
that whines and sniffles when it talks religion, and 
finds its chief delight in haunting graveyards and sit- 
ting on tombstones, the thermometer down to six- 
teen degrees below zero. Some Christians there are 
who have banished the sugar bowl from their table 
of life and replaced it with a vinegar cruet and a 
horseradish jar. I have not so learned Christ. My 
Bible teaches me that to be a Christian is to be filled 
with a peace that passes all understanding. My Bi- 
ble teaches me that to be a Christian is to be possessed 
of a joy that even the angels do not know. My Bible 
teaches me that to be a Christian is to be supremely 
happy. Religion is not a bald-headed monk nor a 
black-robed nun shut up within stone walls and liv- 
ing on bread and water. Religion is a son or a 
daughter of God. As a child of God, Religion is 
blest with both sunshine and liberty. But at the 
same time my Bible teaches me that the joy and 
peace and happiness and light and freedom of the 
Christian life are not drawn from the poisoned well 
of a world of sin, but that they flow out of the heart 
of God. The Christian is dead to the world, and the 
world is dead to him. Paul says that in another 
place. It is as if the Christian and the world were 
both hanging lifeless on a cross, side by side, each of 
them unable to see or hear or touch the other. The 
world crucified to the Christian ; the Christian cruci- 
fied to the world. Both dead. 



CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 163 

Yes, Christianity summons to a crucifixion. That 
is something that hurts the natural flesh. The nails 
hurt. The thorns hurt. The rude beams of the 
cross hurt. I would be false to my trust as a minis- 
ter of the Lord Jesus Christ, if I were to present re- 
ligion in any other way. It demands separation from 
a sinful world. It demands the sacrifice of harmful 
desires. It demands the surrender of blighting pleas- 
ures. There can be no lawful disguising these facts. 
I let them stand before you to-day in all their aus- 
terity of form and feature. They do not wear even 
the shadow of a mask. What Paul here says in the 
text is but an echo of what Christ Himself said. 
Listen! "If any man will come after me, let him 
deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me." 
At the very entrance of the Christian life Christ has 
placed a cross. He who would tread that path finds 
a cross waiting for him. That cross he must shoul- 
der, however painful it may be so to do, and carry it 
clear to the gates of pearl. 

I would solemnly say, therefore, to any who are 
seriously thinking of professing Christ, if you are 
going to remain on friendly terms with the world, if 
the cross you are going to bear is nothing more than 
a florist's cross of wire, filled with roses and twined 
with smilax, if it is your intention to be a Christian 
only in name, sporting a heavenly uniform, but still 
allied with the enemies of God, then, for the sake of 
the Church of Christ, and for your own sake, stay 
out where you really belong. This separation of 



164 CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 

which Paul speaks is not a fence spun by a spider, 
nothing more than gossamer threads floating in the 
air. It is a solid wall of granite built around the 
soul. The world cannot remove one of its stones, 
nor overleap its height. It is a barrier that makes 
a complete separation between Christians and the 
world. 

The fact is that there are too many mere nominal 
Christians in the Church of Christ already. There 
were such in Paul's day. There were such in all 
the following days. There are altogether too many 
such in these days. One of the great errors of this 
present time among ministers and other officials in 
the Church of Christ is a lust for numbers. The mul- 
tiplication table is considered of more worth than the 
Communion table. Persons are urged to join the 
Church in order to swell the Church roll. The con- 
sequence is that many make a profession of religion 
who have no more real piety than there is love in the 
sting of a wasp. They are no more separated from 
the world than fire is opposed to fire. The line that 
divides their spiritual life from the life of the flesh 
is like the lines of latitude and longitude over the sur- 
face of the earth, altogether imaginary. Such bear 
the name of Christian only by courtesy. In their 
case the term Christian is a misnomer. Pretending 
to be grapevines, they bring forth thistles. Pretend- 
ing to be honey, they are gall. Pretending to be pure 
gold, they are naught but brass. They are the chaff 
that will yet fly under the breath of God in the judg- 



CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 165 

ment of the last day. Having never been born again, 
having never truly repented of their sins, having never 
in all sincerity of purpose sought the Cross of Jesus 
Christ, their ears shall be smitten with the words, 
"Depart from me ; I never knew you." 

Oh, my friends, I know of no more terrible place 
to fall into hell than from a church pew! No one 
should join the Church who is not a genuine Chris- 
tian. Not perfect. I do not mean that. By a gen- 
uine Christian I mean one who is prepared to follow 
Christ at any cost, come what may, come what will. 
By a genuine Christian I mean one who is willing to 
turn his back upon sin and face the holiness of God. 
By a genuine Christian I mean one who is ready to 
respond to what God says through Paul in the text, 
and obey it. If these things you cannot do, or will 
not do, then I say once more, stay where you are, 
and do not add any more weight to the burden al- 
ready laid upon the overloaded shoulders of the 
Church of Christ, that burden made up of inconsis- 
tent lives and hypocrisy and utter worldliness. To 
follow the example of some so-called Christians 
would be to walk into a den of lions, and the lions all 
at home! 

In his family, in his business, in his pleasures, in 
everything that he says and does, the Christian is to 
be wholly separate from the world. His whole life 
has been revolutionized, turned completely upside 
down, changed as entirely as the day that now irradi- 
ates the air has been changed from the night that pre- 



166 CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 

ceded it. Otherwise he is not a Christian at all. 
This is the sum and substance of everything that the 
Bible teaches upon the subject of real religion. If 
this be not true, then the very air we breathe is a lie 
to poison the lungs. 

The application of the text to the present time is 
the very same that it was when it first throbbed in 
Paul's brain, and rushed down Paul's arm to the 
ends of his fingers, and flashed, a living sentence, 
from the point of Paul's pen. It is a call to the 
Christian while he is in the world to be not of the 
world. It is God's frown upon whatever is harmful 
to the mind or body or soul. It is God's prohibition 
against spiritual uncleanness. To forsake the world, 
to be the foe of the world's evil practices in business 
and in social life, to be an out-and-out Christian in 
every particular of conversation and conduct, may 
be to carry a cross, but that same cross will grow 
lighter and lighter with the passing days, shrinking, 
and shrinking, and still shrinking, until finally it shall 
become the crown that fadeth not away. On the 
other hand, the crown that is worn by the dupe of Sa- 
tan here upon the earth shall grow heavier and 
heavier, enlarging, and still enlarging, until finally it 
shall become a ponderous cross of iron that shall 
crush the very soul into an endless perdition. "The 
wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal 
life." "Wherefore," and oh, that the words might 
be heeded ! "come out from among them, and be ye 
separate, saith the Lord." 



CHRISTIANITY VS. WORLDLINESS 167 

Friends, this is a call to a higher life than can be 
lived by the sinner. This is the key that would open 
the door of a prison. This is the hammer that would 
shatter the chains of slavery. To come under the 
power and blessing of these words of the text will 
be to enjoy the liberty of the children of God. Who 
would be in captivity when he might be free? The 
text invites to a life that knows no boundary lines of 
blessedness, like the blue of the heaven above invit- 
ing an eagle let out of its cage to spread wings and 
fly and fly, the world beneath more and more losing 
its bulk with every stroke of the exulting pinions 
along the sunny air. Up, up, to the throne of God, 
we are summoned to soar, where there are pleasures 
that never die. 



The Father of the Rain 

Hath the rain a father ? Job 38 : 28. 

If I have any skill of observation, or any skill of 
thought, or any skill in the art of putting things, I 
owe that skill very largely to the Bible. I have been 
studying this Book now for a number of years, find- 
ing it a very storehouse of learning. But I have 
thus far only scratched a little of its surface. In its 
yielding power to an exploring mind it is inexhausti- 
ble. Who thinks of exhausting the Bible? As well 
attempt to drain the ocean dry with a thimble. I 
feel sometimes as if my ministry, clear up to this 
present day, has been nothing more than a prepara- 
tion for preaching from this wonderful Book — a 
practicing of the scales to make the fingers of the 
brain nimble. Perhaps when my life is at its sunset 
I may be able to play a few simple chords upon this 
majestic organ of the Scriptures. 

What a marvelously beautiful figure is that of the 
text ! It is a figure that strikes the mind like a barb, 
and sticks there. You cannot forget it. But let us 
examine it and gather its lessons. I shall treat the 
text as containing an affirmation and three infer- 
ences. 

I. I remark, that the question of the text can be 
answered with an affirmative. A monosyllabic word 



THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 169 

answers the query, but that little word having in it 
the emphasis of a shot from a cannon. "Hath the 
rain a father ?" Yes ! Who is the father of the rain ? 

God! 

In His mountain sermon Christ tells us that the 
flowers have a father. God opens to them the ward- 
robes of the sun and throws over their shoulders 
such garments as even a king cannot afford to wear. 
In all his glory Solomon was not arrayed like a single 
lily of the field — the splendor of that monarch's royal 
attire outrivaled by a daisy or a dandelion or a but- 
tercup or a head of scarlet clover. Christ distinctly 
says that God gives the flowers their raiment. 
"Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, 
which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven, 
shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little 
faith?" 

In that same sermon Christ tells us again that God 
is the father of the birds. "Your heavenly Father 
feedeth them." The eagle, the pelican, the raven, 
the sparrow, the wren, the robin redbreast, the mul- 
titudinous fowls of the air are all feathered by Him 
who covers the orchards and the gardens and the 
wood with garments woven in the loom of light. 

If, then, the flowers of the field and the fowl of the 
air have God as their Father, so has the rain the same 
Father. God is the Father of the rain. Why, in all 
the universe there is not a single foundling. The 
parentage of the stars is known, for in this Book of 
Tob they are mentioned as being in company with the 



170 THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 

Sons of God at the laying of the foundation stones 
of the earth, they and the Sons of God singing to- 
gether and shouting for joy. The parentage of the 
mountains is known, for God is spoken of as bringing 
them forth. The parentage of the oceans is known, 
for God speaks to their waves, and those waves obey. 
So is known the parentage of the rain. It is born of 
God. It is wrapped in the swaddling clothes of the 
clouds. It is rocked in the cradle of the storm. It 
is sung to sleep by the lullaby of the winds. It is 
covered with the embroidered counterpane of the 
grass. The rainbow is the smile of its guardian an- 
gel while in slumber. The flash of swollen brooks 
and mountain torrents is the sparkle of its eyes in 
waking from repose. The roar of water wheels is its 
shout of glee. Beautiful rain ! Child of God ! 

II. I remark, again, that if God is the Father of 
the rain, then is God Nature's King. 

"Oh," but say those who are wise in their own con- 
ceit, "the rain is the result of natural law." Then 
they launch out into a learned discussion about the 
lifting of vapors skyward, and the condensation of 
moisture, and the discharge of heavy clouds, letting 
fall their contents upon the surface of the earth, the 
rain drops pattering down in obedience to natural 
law. 

But law of any kind means a lawgiver. How 
came the Constitution of the United States? How 
came the statutes upon the books of Maryland, Dela- 
ware, or Pennsylvania, or New York? The very fact 



THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 171 

that laws exist at all is proof conclusive that they 
were conceived and framed by living minds. A man 
commits premeditated murder. He is tried for the 
crime and convicted of it. Then he is hung by the 
neck until dead. Some wiseacre comes forth and 
says, speaking of the execution, "Oh, it was the re- 
sult of criminal law." Of course it was. But if it 
should be meant by that statement that criminal law 
supposes a self-elected and self-written manual of 
law, the one making so ridiculous an assertion would 
be laughed into an insane asylum. His very name 
would be a synonym of foolishness. But when athe- 
istic scientists affirm that rain is simply an expression 
of natural law, intending by their words to drive 
God out of being, they are listened to with respect, 
gaining a wide hearing. Yet it is just as absurd to 
talk about law in this case without a lawmaker as it 
would be to so talk in the other case. If anything 
occurs as the result of natural law, and that only, then 
write natural law in capital letters and worship it, 
for natural law must be only another name of God. 
I like better the philosophy of the ancient He- 
brews, who made Jehovah the King of Nature. The 
lightning was the flash of His eye, or the fire of His 
arrows, or the gleam of His sword. The thunder 
was His voice. The mists of the morning were the 
smoke that curled and writhed at the touch of His 
blazing feet upon the hills and the mountains. The 
clouds were His chariots. The winds were the wings 
of His swiftly-flying messengers, or the power of His 



172 THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 

fists, or the treasures of His storehouses. The rain 
was His child. 

With the Bible in hand, I go forth into Nature and 
get close to God. There are many things to suggest 
His presence. The Scriptures are full of metaphors 
and similes that were drawn from Nature. No one 
can deeply study these numerous figures without be- 
coming a lover of Nature. Going forth into Nature 
with the spirit of God's Word in the heart, all the 
sights that bless the eye and all the sounds that bless 
the ear are so many waymarks that direct the feet of 
the soul to Him who is the Author of Nature. Look- 
ing up at the stars, I hear the scratch of James' pen, 
and saying, "The Father of lights, from whom cometh 
down every good and perfect gift, and with whom is 
no variableness nor shadow of turning." Standing 
upon the ocean's beach, in the ceaseless crash of the 
breakers along the strand, and voicing a sublime 
doxology that will sound clear down to the last heart- 
beat of the sea, when there shall be no more sea, I 
hear the thunder of God's command, saying to the 
collected waters, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no 
farther; and here shall thy proud waves be stayed." 
Opening my eyes in the morning, the night-shadows 
gone and sunbeams chasing each other in sport 
across the floor, I see those sunbeams writing with 
their radiant feet the words, "I am the Light of the 
world." In fact there is not a scene or sound that 
fails to call God to mind. The clouds are the tessel- 
lated pavement around His throne as He sits upon the 



THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 173 

circle of the earth. The winds are His servants. 
The mountains are His audience-chambers wherein 
He holds converse with His chosen ones. The flow- 
ers are His poems. The birds are the shuttles that 
weave the air with melodies for His ears. The rain 
is His child — a royal child in robes of flashing silver. 
God is Nature's King. 

III. I remark, again, that if God is the Father of 
the rain, then He certainly knows when to send the 
rain and when to withhold it. Born of God, who 
is the absolute Sovereign of the universe, the rain is 
under God's full control. That is the same God who 
once said, "Let there be light!" the light obeying 
His voice, then spreading its golden wings, then fly- 
ing over the heavens, flying across the seas, flying 
over the mountains and down into the valleys and 
over the plains, and ever afterwards continuing its 
wonderful flight. That is the same God who orders 
the lightnings of the storm, bidding them appear be- 
fore His throne, those lightnings, like obedient chil- 
dren, presenting themselves in God's presence, and 
with voice of thunder, uttered with tongues of fire, 
saying to God, "Here we are!" That is the same 
God who says to the snow, "Be thou on the earth!" 
the snow going forth and tramping the earth with 
white feet. In like manner does God command the 
rain — that rain an army, clad in silver mail, the 
clouds its banners and plumes. He says to that army, 
"Forward, march!" and it marches, going forth to 
overleap the walls of the forests, to scale the heights 



174 THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 

of the hills, to conquer the wheat fields and the corn 
fields. He says again to that army, "Halt!" and it 
halts, its vapory banners furled, its drums hushed, its 
measured footsteps silent, its guns stacked, then, hav- 
ing broken ranks, encamping beneath the tents of the 
blue sky. 

God knowing when to send the rain and when to 
withhold the rain, it is becoming in man to trust in 
God's infinite wisdom. But instead of that, often 
there goes up into God's ears a million-voiced com- 
plaint. There is either too much rain at times or not 
enough rain. Men know better than God. He that 
sits in the heavens must laugh at the conceit that pre- 
sumes to counsel Him! 

I am glad that the government of Nature is under 
God's sceptre. Only He is competent to arrange 
matters for the best. To provide weather suited al- 
ways to all classes of humanity would be too great a 
task for any mortal wisdom. Even God Himself 
does not attempt the task. He sends rain or with- 
holds it in accordance with His knowledge of what is 
needed. 

I give you two scenes. It is early morning in sum- 
mer. A farmer is awakened by the music of rain, 
the falling drops singing their melodies upon the roof 
to the accompaniment of thunder from the organ of 
the storm. "Ah!" the farmer exclaims, "that means 
potatoes, and beans, and full-headed wheat, and 
plenty of corn !" He falls asleep again, dreaming of 
harvest-fields reaped by angels, the flash of their 



THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 175 

scythes answering the flash of the lightnings outside 
the dwelling in which he slumbers, and those angelic 
reapers singing songs that answer the song of the 
ram. When he goes forth to the barn, the falling 
raindrops kiss his shoulders and lie down at his feet, 
as though he were a king to whom homage is due. 

But in another place a different scene is enacted. 
It is in a great city. A maiden is aroused by the same 
rain. The lightning that opens its red wings in her 
bedroom startles her heart. The thunder that rolls 
its majestic tones over the hills of the clouds sounds 
to her like the growl of a wild beast. The rain that 
dashes against the window and patters on the ledge is 
discord. "Oh !" she exclaims, "there will be no pic- 
nic to-day! That horrid rain! I wish that it could 
have waited until to-morrow." Like the farmer, this 
maiden falls asleep again and dreams. In her dream 
she sees a park, and a merry group suddenly over- 
taken by a shower, that group hastily gathering up 
the dishes and food that were spread on the grass be- 
neath a broad-branched tree, and beholds a score 
of ruined hats, and yards of spotted ribbons, and 
twenty muddied skirts, the party running from the 
storm, and reaching a place of shelter just as a cloud 
bursts and whelms the whole landscape with tons of 
deluging water. The maiden awakes once more, and 
carries a frown upon her face the rest of the day. 

These two scenes are more than imaginary. They 
have really occurred hundreds of times. The weather 
that suits one class of people does not at all suit an- 



1 76 THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 

other class. It never did. It never will. So God 
sends the kind of weather that suits Him, knowing 
what is the best kind to send. He is the Father of 
the rain. 

"But," says some one, "would you then discour- 
age praying for rain in a season of drought? Or 
would you discourage prayer for a cessation of rain 
in a time of protracted moisture?" By no means. 
I would no more do that than I would discourage 
prayer in general. Prayer is a mark of confidence in 
God on the part of His children. Prayer to God, 
either in drought or flood, is the evidence of faith in 
His ability to command the rain. But if you want 
rain as an answer to your selfishness, you may pray 
until the breath leaves your lungs and never get rain. 
So if you want rain to cease in order that you may 
indulge your own pleasure, you do not pray under 
such circumstances. Let the motive of prayer be 
right, and there need be no fear of not obtaining the 
right answer. 

The fact is, my friends, that God's sovereignty is 
God's benevolence. It is not fatalism to say that God 
sends rain or withholds rain as He pleases. Fatal- 
ism is blindness; sovereignty is light. Fatalism is 
the grinding of a heel of iron upon the heart of men ; 
sovereignty is the touch of a hand of love. Fatalism 
is a giant that staggers along the walks of Nature; 
sovereignty is the footsteps of a kind father. In 
sending rain, or in withholding rain, God acts from 
a superior standpoint of knowledge. If you can find 



THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 177 

any fatalism in that statement, I wish that I had 
your power of penetrating vision. As well might 
one say that he can look through an eighteen inch 
wall. 

IV. I remark, once more, that if God is the Father 
of the rain, then His providences toward us are the 
expression of His good-will. The very words of the 
text were meant to prove that God is good in His 
dealings with His children. The Lord is here ad- 
dressing Job. Job's friends, so called, had been 
weaving their philosophy in an attempt to solve the 
riddle of that man's woeful afflictions. Out of the 
whirlwind God answered Job, saying to him, "Who 
is this that darkeneth counsel by words without 
knowledge?" That is what much philosophy is — a 
cloud of gloom over a sound of senseless verbiage. 
Job's friends had an inexhaustible "gift of gab." 
They nearly pestered the life of the old man out of 
him. For once he lost his patience, exclaiming, 
"Miserable comforters are ye all!" I do not blame 
him. It takes more than the colored candy of mere 
philosophy to comfort a heart that has graves in it, 
or that is pinched by disappointment, or that is under 
the iron-soled foot of tribulation. What you and I 
need in trouble is to know that God is near. 

The Lord here puts to Job a series of questions, 
among them the query of the text, "Hath the rain a 
father?" All of those questions were for the purpose 
of bringing to Job's mind the fact that God means 
only good in the exercise of His sovereign will. That 
12 



178 THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 

is the one great lesson that we all need to learn. Some 
of us have been puzzling over it for a long time. It 
is not a hard lesson to master. The difficulty is that 
we are dull of brain. But when we shall have once 
fully learned that lesson, we shall be wise men and 
women, ready for graduation into a higher school. 
Many, however, have learned it; and the triumph of 
it has made life sweet and bright and melodious. 

"Hath the rain a father ?" Yes ; God is its Father. 
Then God will not send forth His child or keep it 
home except in blessing. Neither will He cause pain 
or grief in your life or mine without intending thereby 
to work in us the highest good. The rain that smiles 
in the sunshower or weeps in the storm, goes alike 
to the hearts of the flowers, washing those flower 
hearts with benedictions. So with the rain of trouble. 
It comes by the grace of Him who is the Father of 
the physical rain — your Father; my Father. 

You know that it is a great risk to sign your name 
to a blank check, leaving that check in some one's 
hands to fill in an amount. You would not do that, 
except for one in whom you had the highest confi- 
dence. But that is what God does for His children. 
The Bible is full of such checks, all of them bearing 
God's signature, and left for His children to put in 
any amount they wish. Here is one of those checks 
awaiting your penmanship in figures : "He that spared 
not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, 
how shall he not with him also freely give us all 
things." 



THE FATHER OF THE RAIN 179 

When I began to think of this sermon, I wondered 
how I could get the Cross of Christ into it. But 
yonder that Cross stands. In the shadow of that 
Cross, name on this almighty check any sum that you 
please, endorsing it with faith, and the Bank of 
Heaven will cash it for you. The Father of the rain 
will give grace for every tear that you shed, for every 
sob that breaks from your lips, for every burden that 
weights your shoulders, and for every grave that 
opens dark and terrible before your feet. Is it hard 
to trust in God ? "Freely give us all things I" 

"Hath the rain a father?" Answer, ye clouds of 
heaven! Answer, ye winds of the air! Answer, ye 
flowers of field and garden ! Then I see those clouds 
writing the answer, writing it with convoluted pencil 
upon the blue sheet of the overarching sky. Then I 
hear the rising winds whisper the answer, afterwards 
putting more emphasis into their voice. Then I catch 
the fragrance of the flowers, and I know that the 
flowers have breathed the answer in perfume. The 
answer comes, "Yes; the rain hath a Father!" My 
heart cries out, "Is He my Father?" Behold yonder 
the glorious answer ! See the Cross of Jesus Christ ! 
Read the inscription that glows along the transverse 
beam of that wondrous Cross ! — "He that spared not 
his own Son." It is enough. He will "freely give all 
things." In the light of that promise I am willing 
to walk all the remainder of my days. The Father of 
the rain is my Father. God pity those who have no 
glad consciousness of that fact! 



The Six Seraphic Wings 

Each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, 
and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. 
Isaiah 6 : 2. 

Earthly kings sit upon their thrones in great 
state. Golden crowns, set with sparkling gems, 
adorn their brow. Splendid robes grace their shoul- 
ders. Courtiers surround them in brilliant array. 
So sat Ahasuerus, reigning over a hundred and 
twenty-seven provinces, his sceptre stretching its 
power from India to Ethiopia. So sat Solomon, the 
most renowned of Hebrew monarchs. So sat Augus- 
tus Caesar, ruling the mighty empire of Rome. 

But what, after all, is a human king? His breath 
is in his nostrils. His lips are dust. He is a crea- 
ture of flesh and blood. His palace walls, his throne, 
his coronet, his attendants are but the outward sym- 
bols of a perishable splendor. Call the roll of the 
world's kings and queens of the past centuries, and 
there is no response. No royal tongue answers. Si- 
lence! Dead! All dead! 

In exalted vision, however, Isaiah beholds within 
the Jerusalem Temple a King whose throne is eter- 
nal in the heavens. His crown outflashes the sun. 
His garments are more richly spangled with jewels 
than are the midnight skies with stars. His atten- 



THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 181 

dants breathe the breath of immortality. His sceptre 
sways over a universe. He is the King of kings and 
Lord of lords. Compared with the majesty that be- 
longs to Him, the stateliness of earthly monarchs is 
like a fading picture of the ocean in comparison with 
the ocean itself, as it rolls sublimely between the 
shores of the continents. 

The text calls upon us to consider the high class 
of angels who stand before the august throne of the 
Lord God Almighty. We are to observe, in particu- 
lar, their attitude of reverence and humility, and the 
swiftness of their obedience. These angels are the 
very brightest angels of all heaven, the seraphim, 
that name signifying burners, and that name bestowed 
upon them as indicative of their wondrous flaming 
beauty. Yet with all their brilliance of face and 
figure, they are but sparks out of the conflagration 
of God's uncreated glory. Each one of that throng 
of heaven's most distinguished angels standing be- 
fore the throne of God, as the prophet saw them, 
had six wings. With two of those wings each one 
covered his face. With two wings each one hid his 
feet. With two wings each one did fly. Wings as a 
veil. Wings as drapery. Wings as instruments of 
locomotion. 

I. We are to note the reverence of these six-winged 
seraphim of Isaiah's vision. "With twain he cov- 
ered his face." A crowd of dazzling courtiers be- 
fore the throne of God, and not one daring to gaze 
with unshaded eyes upon the effulgent majesty that 



182 THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 

blazes from that throne. Posture of reverential awe 
in the presence of God. Let these seraphim of heaven 
be examples for mankind. The world to-day needs 
the lesson they teach. 

I would remark that this lesson is needed in re- 
gard to the natural world. I do not know how it is 
in other countries, but here in America we are sac- 
rificing the beauty of our scenery to the spirit of 
commercialism. Advertisements deface our fields. 
They splash with paint the rocks of the mountains. 
They offend the eye at every turn of a railroad jour- 
ney. Even is the grandeur of the ocean marred by 
them. I was reading of a wrecked vessel on the coast 
of New Jersey off Asbury Park. Upon one of the 
spars of that ship some enterprising agent had fixed 
a huge sign. The inscription along it urged those 
who walked the beach to use a certain brand of whis- 
key ! In one sense that sign was appropriately placed. 
Those who answered its business call would them- 
selves be wrecked, like the ship upon which it was 
displayed — wrecked in body and soul. But what 
blasphemous irreverence it was that nailed that sign 
out where God plants His footsteps, walking the 
glistening pavement of the waves ! 

I like what I once read of an old Scotchman 
among his native hills. He was found one morning 
at the door of his cottage with his hat in hand. When 
asked why he stood in that posture, his answer was, 
"Mon, I stand here ivery day with my bunnit off to 
the beauty o' the landscape. God is here." 



THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 183 

I say that we need to cultivate more reverence for 
the handiwork of God. We need to behold more His 
creative genius in the world around us. If the 
brightest angels of heaven veil their faces in the 
presence of God, who are we that we should be un- 
moved under a sunset, or have no emotion when 
treading beneath the starlit skies, or impiously laugh 
and chatter when our Maker is riding by in a chariot 
of storm? The world with all its natural scenery 
proclaims the glory of God. Let men reverence 
Him. 

Again, this lesson of reverence is needed in regard 
to the Lord's name. "The Lord will not hold him 
guiltless who taketh his name in vain." That was one 
of the thunderbolts that shook Mt. Sinai. Its echoes 
have not yet died away. They are still rumbling. 
God's laws are never repealed. Mt. Sinai has not 
been leveled to the ground. But in spite of God's 
command, how many violate this moral precept that 
cannot be annulled! The Mohammedans destroy 
every piece of paper that they find in the streets or 
along the road, fearing that it may contain the name 
of God, and that name on it may be put to some base 
use. That is superstitious reverence. But thousands 
in Christian countries go to the other extreme, show- 
ing no reverence at all for the name of God. That 
name is profaned in the home, in the field, in the 
shop, in the office, in the court-room. Not only does 
profanity blister the lips of men and women and 
children, but it stains the pages of the newspaper, 



i84 THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 

the leaves of the magazine, and the chapters of the 
novel. Often in literature the profanity is not made 
glaring; but it is profanity nevertheless. A wolf is 
a wolf, even when masked by sheep's clothing. As a 
servant of the Most High God, I protest against the 
ejaculation of such irreverent phrases as, "O God!" 
and "My God !" and "Bless the Lord !" by characters 
in stories who are shown to have no piety. When 
God's name is used in any way whatsoever, with no 
reverence in the speech or the writing, that holy name 
is blasphemed. God cannot hold him guiltless who 
sins against Him either with tongue or pen. 

Again, this lesson of reverence is needed in regard 
to the Lord's Sabbath. That lesson was never more 
needed than in these boasted days of the twentieth 
century. We may laugh at the unbending rigidity of 
our Puritan fathers in reference to the keeping of the 
Sabbath; but we cannot afford to laugh. Plymouth 
Rock is a better foothold for the feet than the willowy 
foundation of extreme liberalism. If they of New 
England were wrong in their strict observance of the 
Sabbath, we of the United States are more wrong in 
our lax observance of the Sabbath. Their Sabbath 
was rocked in the cradle of reverence toward God; 
ours is being laid out in funeral robes in the coffin 
of irreverence. Where is the Sabbath of former 
days? For response, I hear the voice of the news- 
boy hawking papers through the streets of our cities. 
I hear the roar and rattle of excursion trains along 
the railroads. I hear the tramp of moving throngs 



THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 185 

on pleasure bent. I hear the whistle of steamboats 
on the rivers. I hear the splash of oars in the creeks 
and on the lakes. I hear the multiplied sounds that 
bring an ache to the heart and a pain to the soul, and 
extort from the lips a mournful cry, those lips say- 
ing, "God's holy day is forgotten !" And the bells 
that ring their invitations to deserted sanctuaries 
echo it — "Forgotten!" And breathing organs sigh 
it in minor key — "Forgotten!" And from faithful 
lips that voice the praise of the Lord issues a tone 
of sadness that intensifies the word, these trembling 
lips saying, "Forgotten !" But hark ! I hear another 
sound. It drops from the heavens like an angel's 
song. It is both a command and an entreaty. It 
speaks with emphatic pathos. Hear it ! — "Remember 
the Sabbath day to keep it holy !" Let all Christians 
see to it that they reverence the Lord's day. It is 
God's gift to the world. Like all of His gifts, it is 
charged and surcharged with blessing. 

II. We are to note the humility of these six- winged 
seraphim of Isaiah's vision. "With twain he covered 
his feet." "That attitude was in token," says Albert 
Barnes, "of their nothingness and unworthiness in the 
presence of the Holy One." These bright seraphim 
veiled their feet with two of their wings to denote 
how far beneath God they were. It was the hiding 
of their lower extremities under the vision of their 
King. Seraphic modesty. 

Now, if the brightest and noblest and most ex- 
alted of heaven's angels, privileged to be the cour- 



186 THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 

tiers of the Lord God Almighty, are thus accus- 
tomed to an attitude of humility, what should be the 
mind of man towards God? While in one sense this 
world is the palace of God, in another sense it is 
naught but His footstool. There are mightier worlds. 
In fact, this world is one of the meanest and most in- 
significant of all worlds — a mere mote that swims in 
the radiance of millions of suns. Compared with 
God, what are the inhabitants of such a world ? Isa- 
iah says, "All nations before him are as nothing; and 
they are counted to him less than nothing, and van- 
ity." This same Isaiah, in one of his marvelous par- 
agraphs, tries to give some idea of the greatness of 
God. He speaks of God as measuring the waters in 
the hollow of His hand. Just as you might hold a 
few drops of water in the palm of your hand, so God 
holds the Atlantic, the Pacific, the Mediterranean, 
and all the other oceans and seas of the earth. Isa- 
iah again speaks of God as weighing the mountains 
in scales, and the hills in a balance. Just as a mer- 
chant weighs the goods in his store, so God takes up 
the Alps, the Andes, and the Sierra Nevadas, accur- 
ately estimating the number of their pounds avoir- 
dupois. Isaiah still again speaks of God as sitting 
upon the circle of the earth, before whom earth's in- 
habitants are as grasshoppers, and who spreads out 
the blue heavens as a tent in which to dwell, stretch- 
ing that azure canvas of the sky as easily as a boy 
lifts up and outward a play tent for summer pastimes. 
He is the Lord God Almighty. No wonder that the 



THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 187 

angels around His throne hide their limbs and feet 
beneath a veil of wings! 

But that seraphic humility, alas! is often sadly 
lacking in men. Often we do not fear to run in be- 
fore God with thoughtless pride. Nadab and Abihu, 
the sons of Aaron, offered strange fire before the 
Lord, which He commanded them not to do, and they 
were smitten by God's avenging glory — struck dead 
for their want of humility. Uzzah touched the Ark 
of God when it was in danger of falling, and for fail- 
ing to recognize the infinite distance between him and 
his Lord, God felled him to the earth in his tracks. It 
is dangerous business to play with sacred things. How 
does that passage read from one of the sermons of 
Ecclesiastes ? "Keep thy foot when thou goest to the 
house of God, and be more ready to hear, than to give 
the sacrifice of fools ; for they consider not that they 
do evil. Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thy 
heart be hasty to utter anything before God ; for God 
is in heaven, and thou upon earth." 

"Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of 
God." Yes, Solomon, that is a reminder of humility 
that is needed by all worshipers, not only in thy time, 
but in all times. With two wings the seraphs covered 
their feet before God. Who then are we that so often 
engage in the services of the sanctuary in anything 
but a reverentially humble spirit? God's house is no 
place for merriment or idle gossip. 

I remember hearing once a story of one being taken 
tn vision to a certain church on the Sabbath day. An 



188 THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 

angel was his guide. The organist was vigorously 
playing his instrument, but there was no sound from 
the pipes. The choir and congregation were lustily 
singing, but their voices were not heard. Then the 
minister offered prayer, but though his lips moved, 
no tones issued from them. The man in his dream 
greatly wondered at what he saw, and asked the an- 
gel what it all meant. His guide answered, "You 
hear nothing because there is nothing to hear. These 
are not engaged in the worship of God at all, for 
there is no heart in their worship. This is naught 
but proud formality. God hears only that service 
which honors Him. This silence is the silence that 
is around God's ears when no humility is in the 
hearts of those who sing and pray. But listen now !" 
And listening, the man heard a child's treble voice 
ringing out clear in the silence of the building, as the 
minister seemed to pray and the people seemed ta 
join his petition, that child's voice saying, "Our 
Father, who art in heaven; hallowed be thy name." 
"That," said the angel, "is the only true worship in 
this great temple to-day. Man looketh on the out- 
ward appearance, but God looketh on the heart. 
The prayer of that child is rising to God's throne." 

Would that the same angel, not in vision only, but 
in reality, would open the eyes of all Christendom f 
If we could all see ourselves as God sees us, there 
would be many an unhallowed thought put away 
while we are professedly worshiping the Lord in 
His sanctuary. Then, like the seraphim of the text 



THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 189 

covering their feet with two wings, we should wear 
the robes of reverential humility. What blasphemous 
attitudes are often assumed in the presence of God ! 

III. We are to note the swiftness of obedience 
characteristic of the seraphim of Isaiah's vision. 
"With twain he did fly." Not only reverent and 
abased before the Lord of glory, but instantly and 
with alacrity giving heed to His commands. "With 
twain he did fly." 

This remarkable chapter blossoms with wings. I 
am as much impressed with these flying wings of that 
seraphic host as I am with the wings folded. What 
a rustling of wings when the King gives His orders ! 
Mercury, the fabled messenger of the gods of Greece, 
was represented as having wings on his feet, those 
wings increasing his speed, as he rushed forth on er- 
rands for superior divinities. But Mercury would 
be a snail in comparison with a modern express train 
when placed beside one of these six-winged seraphim 
of Jehovah. The idea here is that these bright be- 
ings used all their wings for flight when they went 
forth from God's immediate presence, the twain with 
which they did fly, while before God, simply keeping 
them poised around Him, the other four wings cov- 
ering face and lower extremities as they attended 
God's court. When told to go forth on some behest, 
six broad wings carried them like a lightning flash 
to distant worlds. 

I believe that such is the right interpretation. Six 
wings for flight upon the errands of the Lord. Yes ; 



190 THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 

they come very swiftly in obedience to God. If our 
eyes could be opened, as were the eyes of Elisha's 
servant, we should see them. Angels in our homes. 
Angels in our business. Angels along our streets. 
Angels as we journey along the rail or over the 
waters. Angels crowding the air. The highways of 
the heavens on fire with angels. "Are they not all 
ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them 
who shall be heirs of salvation?" 

That is the only kind of spiritualism in which I 
believe — the triune God a spirit, and His angels 
spirits. If there are spirits that rap on tables, and 
open doors that are fastened, and ring bells, and 
perform other circus feats, they must be bad spirits. 
God sends His angels only upon errands of love and 
mercy. There are crosses laid on feeble shoulders; 
the angels of God lighten the weight. There are 
broken hearts; the angels of God bind up those 
hearts with divine surgery. There are tears of sor- 
row that write anguish upon the cheek ; the angels of 
God breathe upon those tears and crystallize them 
into gems of joy. Wings! Wings! Wings! With 
twain they fly around the throne of God, these an- 
gels, two wings covering the face, two wings cover- 
ing the feet ; but with six wings they hasten to Chris- 
tian souls in trouble. 

Let there be a like promptness of obedience on our 
part in the service of God. You and I lack wings, 
but that is no excuse for listlessness or inactivity. 
We need to put more swiftness into our feet in work- 



THE SIX SERAPHIC WINGS 191 

ing for the Lord. There are many feet so laggard 
that they seldom get to the sanctuary on the Sabbath, 
and never reach the prayer-meeting at all. Those 
same feet are quick enough along the street for bus- 
iness or pleasure. One is tempted to look at such 
feet, closely examining them, to see if they have Mer- 
cury's little wings fastened to them, so quickly do 
they move in selfish interests. But for the culture 
of the soul those same feet seem to be dead. For the 
service of God they seem to be loaded with iron. 

But who is this I see? A Stranger is walking up 
yonder aisle. There are sandals on His feet ; but be- 
neath the leather thongs that bind those sandals fast 
I see on each foot a scar. Bow in His presence ! It 
is He of Calvary. He speaks ! Listen ! "With these 
feet I walked for you into humiliation and poverty 
and death. What are you doing for Me ?" 

Let us go to our homes, bearing in mind the fact 
that Christ has been with us in the sanctuary, not 
in imagination only, but in the fact. Wherever His 
disciples are, there He is. And let the question that 
He asked of both you and me nestle in our hearts, 
that question being the inspiration of our feet, our 
hands, our eyes and ears, and our lips. Hear it again, 
that plaintive question from Him who died for us ! 
"What are you doing for Me?" Ye six- winged ser- 
aphim hovering over this scene, fly swiftly back to 
the throne of the glorified Christ with the news of 
our consecration! "The Lord our God will we 
serve, and His voice will we obey." 



Words Fitly Spoken 

A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of 
silver. Prov. 25: 11. 

Different commentators give different interpre- 
tations of this flashing simile from Solomon's pen. 
Some think that the apples here referred to are real 
fruit, a rich yellow in color, and showing their beauty 
of hue upon plates with a network of silver around 
the rim. Others think that the royal author was 
making his poetic simile from embroideries of golden 
fruit wrought into a background of silvery material, 
those embroideries hung upon the walls of a palace 
for purposes of adornment, and thus appearing as 
pictures. But we need not stop to inquire further 
into the matter. Solomon's kingly pen has long 
since been laid aside and gone into dust, and he him- 
self, as a being of earth, is no more. Not being able 
to interview him, we shall have to remain in doubt as 
to the real meaning of the comparison here used. 
But whatever is meant by it, this one thing is certain, 
that Solomon intended to set forth the possibilities of 
well chosen words. The literal translation of the 
Hebrew phrase, "A word fitly spoken," is, "A word 
spoken on its wheels." The American Revised Ver- 
sion gives it in the margin, "A word spoken in due 
season." That brings in the thought of opportunity 



WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 193 

and appropriateness in regard to words. So doe? 
the English Revision render it in the same way, but 
making the simile read, "Like apples of gold in bas- 
kets of silver/ ' while the American Revision says, 
"Like apples of gold in network of silver." But as 
all versions agree in reference to the kind of words 
described, and do not materially disagree in their 
translation of the simile, I shall treat the text as it 
stands in all three of the versions. In whatever way 
rendered, it is one of Solomon's gems, and its scin- 
tillations awaken in my mind a multitude of thoughts. 

I. A thought about the beauty of words. It is 
probable that Solomon had that same thought in 
mind. A word fitly spoken is suggestive of such 
beauty as is seen in a collection of fruit served in 
baskets of silver, or fruits showing their mellowness 
upon the table in platters that have a network of sil- 
ver around their edges; and whether in baskets or 
plates, those fruits making pictures that please the 
eye. Solomon's phrase is itself a choice word-pic- 
ture. 

What is more beautiful than ripe fruit? Beautiful 
the cherries that blush against the embracing hands 
of the leaves in the month of June! Beautiful the 
pears that hang like ear-rings from the orchards in 
autumn ! Beautiful the apples that glow like embers 
from the setting sun amid the radiance of October's 
fading foliage ! All ripe fruits are like fruits of gold 
in pictures of silver. I do not know which I admire 
the most, God's paintings of rainbows in ebony frame 
13 



194 WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 

of storm, God's paintings of clouds in frame of blue 
sky or frame of sunrise, God's paintings of forests in 
frame of emerald or frame of fire, God's paintings 
of light in frame of ocean, or God's paintings of fruit 
in frame of boughs and leaves. All are beautiful. 

You will notice that the point of the text is in re- 
gard to words fitly spoken, not simply words in gen- 
eral. There are many words that are not beautiful. 
Lord Byron wrote some poems whose words have 
in them much of beauty ; he wrote many more whose 
words are lepers hidden beneath an embroidered 
mantle of rhetoric. So wrote Robert Burns. So 
wrote Thomas Moore. So wrote Shakespeare. So 
have written others among the world's masters of 
expression. But it is only words fitly spoken, 
whether by voice or pen, that can lay any claim to 
beauty. 

Among the words that are not beautiful I would 
place all those words that throw discredit upon the 
inspiration of the Scriptures. Be on your guard 
against all such words. They crawl like sneaking 
serpents over the columns of the daily newspaper, 
over the pages of the monthly periodicals, over the 
chapters of the popular novel. Hardly a week passes 
that I do not catch the gleam of their wicked eyes 
and hear the hiss of their poisonous throats. The in- 
spiration of the Scriptures is not a mere dogma of 
theology, but God's truth. That doctrine is the very 
foundation of the Christian faith. Whatever weak- 
ens it tends to destroy it altogether. Once let doubts 



WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 195 

enter the mind as to the historic authenticity of Bib- 
lical events and persons, and it will not be a great 
while before the whole brain will be tramped with 
murderous feet. If Adam and Eve were only mythi- 
cal beings, if Abraham was a fictitious character, if 
Jonah never existed, except in the fancy of the one 
who wrote of him, then what warrant have we for 
believing in the reality of any of the names given in 
the Scriptures? The scholarship that uses its batter- 
ing ram of words to make a single breach in the walls 
of Inspiration will not hesitate to lay every stone 
of the structure in ruins, going on with its destruc- 
tive criticism until it has leveled the Cross of Christ 
to the ground and rocked the very throne of God 
into the dust. Talk about anarchy! I do not know 
which anarchy is the worse, the anarchy that throws 
bombs at kings and shoots presidents, or the anarchy 
that seeks the overthrow of God's Holy Word. Yes ! 
I have it. This last named anarchy is the worse. 
There may be new rulers to take the place of those 
set aside ; but the death of the Scriptures would make 
a funeral of hopeless sorrow. Whenever in your 
reading or hearing you come upon words that speak 
disparagingly of the Bible, even if they be words 
that wear crowns of gold and robes of purple, regard 
them as ugly words, misshapen words, hypocritical 
words, all beautiful without, but within full of 
rottenness. Instead of being "like apples of gold in 
pictures of silver," they are like toadstools growing 
from the decayed stump of a fallen tree. 



196 WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 

Also among words that are not beautiful I would 
place all those words that are caricatures of good 
language. These are profane words, filthy words, 
slang words. One may not be sufficiently educated 
to speak with grammatical exactness every time he 
gives expression to a thought, but there is no excuse 
whatever for using words that are bad. It is possi- 
ble always to speak well chosen words. John Bun- 
yan was not a man who had been trained in the 
schools of his day, yet he wrote a book that has been 
the admiration of scholars ever since his pen gave it 
birth in Bedford jail more than two centuries ago. 
Thomas Macaulay, the English historian accorded 
it the very highest praise. Its words are nearly all 
Anglo-Saxon words, many of them words of one 
syllable, the whole book a powerful argument for 
beautiful speech, words fitly spoken, "like apples of 
gold in pictures of silver," without the aid of a lib- 
eral education. While there are hosts of words in 
our language that have upon them no taint or odor 
of corruption, why should one load his speech with 
words that are an insult to his mother tongue? Yet 
there are hundreds of persons in every community 
who seldom open their mouths without giving voice 
to some kind of abuse of language, either that of pro- 
fanity or that of slang. They need to make David's 
prayer, "Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; 
keep the door of my lips." They need to practice 
Paul's injunction, "Let your speech be alway with 
grace, seasoned with salt." They need to tremble at 



WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 197 

Christ's statement, ''I say unto you that for every 
idle word that men shall speak, they shall give ac- 
count thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy 
words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou 
shalt be condemned." 

II. A thought about the music of words. I speak 
not now of the rhythm of poetry, nor of the meas- 
ured tread of an orator's words, as they march in 
stately ranks across the field of his speech, words on 
parade, with flying banners and beating drums and 
blowing trumpets; nor of the words that flow like a 
brook through the flowery pages of some George 
Eliot, or Charles Dickens, or Nathaniel Hawthorne; 
nor of words sounded from the golden cornet of such 
princely essayists as Thomas Macaulay, or Ralph 
Waldo Emerson, or John Ruskin. If you wish to 
learn the music of words, you can do no better than 
to listen day and night to the canaries that sing in the 
cage of the Bible. This grand old Book is itself the 
very richest of music. But I am not now thinking of 
words that breathe with the graces of rhetoric. Of 
what then do I speak? Why, of words uttered in 
every-day life — words common ; words simple ; words 
with their working clothes on ; yet words that are as 
musical as a bar of melody in the score of a Mozart, 
or a John Sebastian Bach; words fitly spoken, and 
that are "like apples of gold in pictures of silver." 

Among such words I place the words of thanks- 
giving in prayer. These are words fitly spoken, 
and they rise to God's ears with all the sweetness of 



198 WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 

an angel's song. Thankful words for the ordinary 
blessings of life; for home and dear ones; for rai- 
ment and food; for vision and hearing; for mental 
faculties unimpaired and use of limbs ; for life itself. 
We all know the harmony struck out of words of 
gratitude following the bestowal of a gift. The very 
nerves vibrate in unison with such words. Is God 
different from us? Think you that He carries a 
heart of stone within His breast? If it gives us 
pleasure to hear the music of thankfulness, such 
pleasure also belongs to Him. We are each a minia- 
ture of God. His image is impressed upon our souls. 
The question is, Are we all accustomed to thankful- 
ness for the gifts of God? It is comparatively easy 
to take part in some grand anthem of thanksgiving, 
when there are many voices, and when the theme of 
the choral is the large mercies of God. But I am 
speaking now of secret solos in the silence of one's 
closet or heart, the individual soul lifting music 
words to the ears of God for those things that come 
every day, and of which thousands of minds never 
stop to think. These are the words that I term me- 
lodious. These are the words that are fitly spoken, 
and that are "like apples of gold in pictures of silver." 
Also among such words I place words of sympa- 
thy with those who are in trouble. This 
is a world of trouble. The skies that bend 
over us are not always blue, but often storm- 
tramped. The paths we tread are not always smooth 
and easy, but often rough with stones that cut the 



WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 199 

feet. The seas we sail are not always sun-glinted, 
but often shadowed. The cups we drink are not al- 
ways sweet, but often bitter. We need often to hear 
the music of sympathy breaking harmoniously upon 
our hearing. Those around us have the same need. 
Then it is that Love sweeps her harp with the most 
thrilling melodies. Then it is that words fitly spoken 
are words on wheels, coming swiftly and surely to 
their destination. Then it is that appropriate words 
are "like apples of gold in pictures of silver." Let 
no Christian heart seal itself against the tuneful 
chords of such words, refusing to sound them. 

Among words that are not musical I would place 
angry words. The common ground for letting loose 
such words is in the home circle. There are men who 
in their business relations are the most urbane of men, 
but who under their own roof-tree are like a locomo- 
tive whistle in their tone of voice. The same kind of 
utterance elsewhere would bring the blow of a fist 
upon their face every hour of the day. There are 
women who are abroad the very soul of sweetness, 
but who around their own fireside speak like explod- 
ing torpedoes, the parlor, the dining-room, the kitchen 
the scene of a perpetual Fourth of July. But why 
should music words be reserved for strangers, and 
the ears of dear ones and servants be hammered with 
dissonant words? Let the tunefulness of speech be 
everywhere sounded. But let the richest notes of the 
tongue be heard among those who are closest to us in 
life and service. 



200 WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 

There were two sisters in a fable. One was gen- 
tle of speech ; the other spoke as if her tongue was a 
file. A fairy gave to each of them a gift appropriate 
to the habits of utterance of each. One girl there- 
after, whenever she spoke, dropped pearls and dia- 
monds from her lips ; her sister let fall toads and ser- 
pents. 

What this world needs is more jewel-words. Let 
reptilian words sneak their way back to the perdi- 
tion from which they came. Says Paul in the only 
sonnet he ever wrote, "Though I speak with the 
tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I 
am become sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal." 

III. A thought about the power of words. What 
are words? It depends upon the words themselves. 
Words spoken by a Demosthenes can call a nation to 
arms. Words spoken by a Gladstone can influence 
a parliament. Words spoken by a Wendell Phillips, 
or a Henry Grady can thrill a continent. Words fitly 
spoken are the lightning flashes of great minds — 
thunderbolts. Moses once spoke, and filled the cen- 
turies with echoes. David spoke, and caught the ears 
of an audience of many generations. Paul spoke, and 
his words were embalmed in theologies. Luther 
spoke, and shook all Europe out of ecclesiastic bond- 
age. John Knox spoke, and made a government 
tremble. The Wesleys spoke, and George Whitfield, 
and Jonathan Edwards, and Finney, and Moody, and 
swayed multitudes with revivals of religion. What 
are words ? They are thought on the wing ; thought 



WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 201 

on swift errands; thought linked with Omnipotence. 
A breath expresses them; a dash of the pen gives 
them being on paper ; but simple as they are, they are 
akin to divinity — the sparks of Wisdom supreme. 

What are words when God utters them? Words 
upon His lips spoke worlds into existence. Words 
from His lips created light. Words from His lips, 
as He walked incarnate among men, unstopped deaf 
ears, straightened crooked limbs, hushed storms on 
the sea, and rocked graves as though they were 
shaken by an earthquake. Words from His lips 
shall yet halt the march of time, roll back the heav- 
ens as a curtain, and summon a world's inhabitants 
of every age of history to judgment, those same lips 
afterward speaking words that shall enwrap the 
earth in conflagration — Europe on fire ; Asia on fire ; 
Africa on fire; America on fire — those wide-spread- 
ing flames the winding sheet of a dead globe of sin, 
from which death is to rise in resurrection a new 
earth in which dwelleth righteousness. 

Oh, the power of words fitly spoken ! Words may 
be misused, as when a Thomas Paine writes his "Age 
of Reason" ; as when a Hume sneers at Christianity ; 
as when a Voltaire derides Jesus of Nazareth; as 
when a Robert Ingersoll makes the Bible a subject of 
jest and flings the coarseness of his wit into the very 
face of God. But when they are rightly used words 
are imperial. They are packed with dynamite. 

Some say that they have no learning or eloquence, 
and that they are thereby excused from the use of 



202 WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 

powerful words. It was a few words fitly spoken by 
a plain man that turned John B. Gough from drunk- 
enness to sobriety. The echoes of those words were 
afterwards heard on the platform of hundreds of lec- 
ture halls in sublime oratory for the cause of tem- 
perance. It was a few words fitly spoken by an- 
other plain man that inclined the heart of Dwight L. 
Moody to God. How those same words, not many 
years following, reverberated in Great Britain and 
the United States ! It was a few words fitly spoken 
by still another plain man, a warm-hearted, evan- 
gelist, that made T. DeWitt Talmage a preacher of 
the Gospel, by means of the press millions of people 
his audience every week through a long period of 
time. 

Say not that you have no force of words. Use 
whatever words you have, words of voice or pen, that 
voice and that pen consecrated to the service of 
Christ, and the Holy Spirit will give them power. 
Let them be such words as Solomon describes in the 
text, words "on wheels," words "fitly spoken," words 
"in due season," and they shall be "like apples of gold 
in pictures of silver." 

IV. But I come now to speak, in the last place, of 
the greatest of all words. This thought I have re- 
served as the climax of my sermon. Whatever else 
you may forget of what I have thus far said, I pray 
you to give your earnest attention now, so as to be 
able to recall this final thought. 

Words are the dress of thought. That dress may 



WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 203 

be slovenly or elegant, but it is what thought wears 
upon its emergence from the cells of the brain. Turn 
now to the first chapter and first verse of John's 
Gospel, and you will learn of this greatest of all 
words. Listen! "In the beginning was the Word, 
and the Word was with God, and the Word was 
God." 

Here is a thought out of the mind of the Al- 
mighty. Jesus Christ was the manifestation of God. 
He came speaking God's love for a ruined world. 
Yea, He was God Himself who could no longer 
keep His thoughts from mankind, but who must 
needs clothe Himself in human flesh and reveal His 
very heart. There were tokens of His love in the 
past ages; but His coming into the world was the 
embodiment of His love. He is the Word that has 
filled this old earth with more beauty and more music 
and more power than were ever in it before. His 
birth under angelic minstrelsy and stellar magnifi- 
cence, His toil in the Nazareth carpenter shop, His 
life of poverty and persecution, His blood-sweating 
agony in the garden, His arrest and false trials, His 
painful journey to Calvary, His uplifted Cross, with 
its shame, with its cruel nails, with its crown of 
thorns, with its last heart-breaking cry, were all one 
word, and that word Love. And that Word is yet 
to conquer all nations. 

The practical question remains, Do you know 
Christ? Have you gone to school and learned this 
Word? If not, then let the Holy Spirit be your 



204 WORDS FITLY SPOKEN 

Teacher. Frame this Word within your soul, and 
you will find Him to be a word fitly spoken, indeed, 
and more glorious than any fruit that ever glowed in 
any baskets of silver, even though those fruits were 
plucked by angel hands from the gardens of heaven, 
and those flashing baskets were wrought into beauty 
by silversmiths celestial. "He is the chiefest among 
ten thousand." 

"Sweetest note in seraph song, 
Sweetest name on mortal tongue, 
Sweetest carol ever sung, 
Jesus, blessed Jesus." 



Do not Fret 

Fret not thyself. Psalms 37: 1. 

On dark mental days, when in need of good cheer, 
I am apt to turn my heart into the sunshine of the 
Book of Psalms. Like the ancient forests that stored 
many a ray of light for the farther centuries of time, 
the pick of the miner now releasing those treasured 
beams for the dwellings of men, the Psalms are the 
experience of God's children of ages ago lending 
radiance to the children of God in this era of the 
world's history. They are the accumulated sparks 
of comfort that grieving souls may uncover and 
kindle into flame, sitting in their glow and warmth. 

To my mind, this Thirty-seventh Psalm is a master- 
piece of blessedness. It ought to be written in let- 
ters of gold and hung upon the wall of every home 
in Christendom. A most eloquent orator is it of 
faith. Changing the figure, it is a whole orchestra 
of trust in God, opening with soft melody, rising into 
bolder notes, and closing with a grand burst of music. 

Listen to the first strain of this inspired symphony ! 
"Fret not thyself." I take that breathing of harmony 
as my text this morning. 

Does any one say that this is a message only for a 
day long since faded into the night of oblivion? 
That is not true. Just as pertinent is this message 



206 DO NOT FRET 

now as if it had this moment fallen upon your ears 
from the lips of an angel out of heaven. There is no 
mouldy bread in the pantry of the Bible. 

I. I apply the words of the text to those who make 
their life discordant through trifling annoyances. 
"Fret not thyself." That means do not give way to 
thoughts that tease, that irritate, that vex, that make 
anger boil within the heart. Do you ever study 
words? Here is a most interesting word to study* 
I have often found pictures in words as delightful as 
any that ever flamed out before my vision from a 
fire on the hearth. A dictionary has more etchings 
and pastels and engravings and paintings within its 
covers than hang upon the walls of the finest palaces 
of art. This word "fret" is a veritable panorama. 
Look at it as defined by Noah Webster ! It signifies 
"to rub; to eat away; to wear away by friction; to 
corrode; to chafe." Varying definitions, but all of 
them conveying the same idea; when applied to men 
and women picturing a soul thrown out of its normal 
condition, and exhautsing itself and killing itself 
with unnatural excitement. The Hebrew word here 
translated "fret" means to heat, portraying a mind 
inflamed with impatience. 

Well, that is exactly what thousands of persons are 
doing. They are burning themselves into worthless- 
ness, and burning themselves to death, their fretful- 
ness called into being by circumstances that do not 
warrant the least expenditure of energy. How much 
force is wasted in that way! If half of the power 



DO NOT FRET 207 

that is thus squandered upon useless things were ap- 
plied to righteousness, this world would soon be 
rolled into the Millennium. 

Did you ever scan the faces that you daily meet? 
Upon many of them is fretfulness written in unmis- 
takable lines. That word is as deeply cut into them 
as though a chisel had left it in enduring stone. 

I do not refer to the faces along which real sorrow 
has traced its autograph. There are many such 
faces. But these have been sculptured into beauty. 
A charming grace is upon them that arrests the at- 
tention and impresses itself upon the memory. Some 
of the most radiant faces I have ever seen have been 
those of God's aged saints who have passed through 
hundreds of troubles, those faces framed with white 
hair. Sanctified sorrow leaves no disfiguring marks 
on cheek or brow. It lights up the face with the 
shining of heaven. 

The faces I mean are those faces that have been 
grooved and puckered and wrinkled into a scowl by 
constant fretting. Such faces are common sights. 

Many of our drug stores and department stores 
have their counters loaded with various lotions for 
the preservation of female facial loveliness. But the 
very best preservative of beauty for both women and 
men of which I know is the avoidance of fretfulness. 
Make constant use of this prescription given by the 
Psalmist, and it will keep any face from growing 
ugly. Apply this divine ointment when you go to 
bed at night, apply it when you rise in the morning, 



208 DO NOT FRET 

continue the application throughout the day. Thus 
applied, it will keep you as young in soul features 
and as fresh of countenance as though the whole of 
life were the month of May, with no hint in it of De- 
cember or January. 

Fretfulness is a malady that frequently requires 
heroic measures for its elimination from the soul. 
Many persons fall into the habit of worrying over 
little things, that habit developing a typhoid fever 
of anxiety. My advice to all such is, Beware of plac- 
ing yourselves in favorable condition for becoming 
thus terribly afflicted with consuming fretfulness. 
Once let that poison run riot through the blood of the 
soul, and you will need the strongest kind of divine 
medicament before you can recover your spiritual 
health. 

This fretfulness over trifles of which I speak is a 
very common soul disorder. Ministers fret about 
little matters in their parishes — you see I am firing a 
gun that kicks! Merchants fret about little matters 
in their stores. Mechanics fret about little matters 
in their shops. Housewives fret about little matters 
in their homes. Fretfulness blazes in every form of 
human life. But what is the use of it? If fretting 
did any good, it would be well to fret. On the con- 
trary, it does mischief. Therefore it is wrong to 
fret. To all fretful persons Paul's advice to the 
Philippian jailor is most appropriate — "Do thyself 
no harm." Fretfulness is slow suicide. 

I know that we all have our crooked days — days 



DO NOT FRET 209 

when nothing seems to be straight ; days when every- 
thing appears to be awry and out of joint; days when 
the chimney will not draw and the oven will not 
bake; days when customers before the counter are 
like porcupines with outspread quills ; days when the 
sermon does not flow freely from the pen ; days when 
the very air seems to be loaded with disagreeableness. 
On such days one's regular duties, usually light and 
pleasant, are dull and irksome. If you are a man, 
you go through such a day as one with a body full of 
sores, and all the passing moments are fingers dip- 
ped in vinegar, those fingers touching your rawness 
with their acid impressions. If you are a woman, 
the broom that you handle has the weight of a crow- 
bar. Your pie-crust gets the shortening into it the 
wrong way. The apple-dumplings turn out like balls 
of lead. The bread sours. Your servant moves 
among her tasks like a caterpillar afflicted with rheu- 
matism. It is one of your crooked days. But do 
not fret. If you do, you will open yourself to the 
habit of fretting. Then the least thing will tend to 
annoy you, each day adding to the discord set up 
within your soul, and making all the rest of life out 
of tune. Beware of chronic fretfulness. 

I am well aware that these thoughts were not in 
the Psalmist's mind when he wrote the text. But 
that does not make fretting over trifling matters ex- 
cusable. What I am preaching is a religion that 
places its helping hand upon the common things of 
life. Therefore, "fret not thyself." Better is it to 
14 



210 DO NOT FRET 

take one's cares to the Lord, for He careth for you. 
I once heard of a woman who was thrown into mo- 
mentary trouble by the thought of having to enter- 
tain guests at an inopportune time. She prayed for 
strength. That was the right thing to do. What is 
religion worth, if it is not an iron with which to 
smooth out the wrinkles of a crooked day? 

II. I apply the words of the text to those who call 
into question the operation of God's providences in 
the world. This is a form of f retfulness that takes on 
a deeper tone than the one I have dwelt upon. The 
fact is that we all wear spectacles. Some persons 
look at life from a financial standpoint; these wear 
spectacles of silver and gold. Other persons look at 
life from the side of distrust in their fellow-men; 
these wear cynical spectacles. Still other persons 
look at life with the vision of a sunrise before their 
eyes; these wear optimistic spectacles. Others, again, 
look at life in the dark; these wear spectacles that 
magnify the surrounding gloom and fill the soul with 
the morbidness of pessimism. These last named op- 
tical instruments are the worst spectacles that any 
man or woman ever places astride the nose. 

It is to such a class of people that David here ad- 
dresses himself. One of the prominent causes for 
railing at God's providences is the prosperity of the 
wicked. That was true in David's day; it is true in 
our day. In fact, it has been true of every age. I 
suppose that the same discordant tone will be sounded 
from human lips clear down to the first note of the 



DO NOT FRET 21 1 

final trump. The prosperity of the wicked is an 
enigma that many have tried to solve, fretting at 
their inability to make it clear. 

I show you two pictures. Picture the first: The 
home of a godly man. Every day is heard beneath 
that roof the voice of prayer. Among the small col- 
lection of books within those walls the Bible holds the 
chiefest place. The home itself is comfortable, but 
humble. There is an entire absence of luxuries. The 
head of the household is in very moderate circum- 
stances. Measured by the wealth of those who count 
their riches with six ciphers after the first figure of 
the enumeration, he would be pronounced poor. Yet 
he is a square man, an honest man, an upright man. 

Picture the second : A mansion of imposing archi- 
tecture, that handsome edifice surrounded by a park. 
Carpets of the finest weaving abloom on its floors. 
Masterpieces of painting aglow upon its walls. White 
statuary gracing its halls. Cut glass and polished 
silver flashing upon the sideboards of the dining- 
room. The softest down within its bed-chambers. 
Curtains draped and festooned at its windows that 
are like woven frost. Everything that heart could 
wish within that palatial home. But the man who 
lives there made his money by fraud. He is a polite 
rascal, a veneered thief, a leper in broadcloth. There 
is not an honest penny in his purse, nor an unsoiled 
bill in his wallet, nor an honest bond in his bank 
vault. 

These are not fancy sketches. They are found in 



212 DO NOT FRET 

real life. Looking upon these living pictures, many 
persons heat themselves into doubts of the goodness 
of God, those doubts kindled by comparing the lot 
of many a righteous man with the lot of many a 
wicked man. Their thought is that the providences 
of God are not perfectly adjusted. Then their con- 
clusion is that piety has but poor show in this world. 

But who is fully competent to pass judgment upon 
such cases? It is this very thing against which Da- 
vid here warns. He says, "Fret not thyself because 
of evil doers, neither be thou envious against the 
workers of iniquity." 

The Psalmist has also drawn some pictures. Look 
at them! In one picture a wicked man is in great 
power ; and he spreads himself like a green bay tree ; 
but soon that picture fades completely away, vanish- 
ing under the withering breath of divine justice. On 
the other hand, the perfect, or well rounded man, 
ends his days in peace, the picture remaining and 
growing brighter. One picture closes with darkness ; 
the other has its shadows chased off by the dawn of 
everlasting day. 

Like a breath from woods of pine into lungs 
long filled with foul air, David here inspires patience 
in those who question God's permission of iniquitous 
prosperity. The time of blooming for the wicked 
is short. "For they shall soon be cut down like the 
grass, and wither as the green herb." Therefore, no 
reason can any child of God have for being men- 
tally disturbed by the prosperity of evil men. "Fret 



DO NOT FRET 213 

not thyself" because of them. Leave everything in 
God's hands. In due season the scythe of judgment 
will sweep the fields of sin. 

But let no one make the mistake of supposing that 
righteousness is always down and unrighteousness 
always up. That is a false supposition. Religion is 
not a taskmaster ; it is sin that flourishes a whip. Re- 
ligion does not put handcuffs upon the wrists and 
chains around the ankles ; it is sin that enslaves. Re- 
ligion does not blow out the lights of happiness from 
the soul; it is sin that creates gloom. Because here 
and there we see a wicked man apparently enjoying 
life, drinking sweetness from a cup of gold, eating 
pleasant fruits from a platter of silver, and wearing 
the finest raiment, we are not to infer that it pays to 
serve the devil. "The wages of sin is death." Do 
not study logic from the textbooks of hell. Too 
many do that. Take full views of truth. 

A frog leaps out upon a piece of rotten board to 
sun himself, and because he sees nothing but swamp 
around him, he reasons that the whole world is a 
swamp, and built expressly for frogs. But the frog's 
vision is narrow and circumscribed. It is well for us 
to climb high and view the whole landscape of a re- 
ligious life. Over that life play the sunbeams of 
Paul's inspired statement — "Godliness is profitable 
unto all things, having promise of the life that now 
is, and of that which is to come." Therefore, "fret 
not thyself." 

You and I are not to worry ourselves about any 



214 DO NOT FRET 

of God's providences. When there comes something 
into the life that you cannot understand, do with it 
what you do with bones when you are eating fish. 
Too many persons choke themselves with seeming 
mysteries. Let what you cannot understand go. 
There is no use trying to masticate every hard thing 
that presents itself to the teeth. Instead of fretting 
about losses and disappointments and graves, try the 
effect of trusting in the wisdom and goodness of God. 
Some persons throw themselves into a fever of 
anxiety over so-called providences that they have 
themselves brought about. They wonder, for exam- 
ple, why they are often sick, when if they would pay 
more attention to the laws of health, they could 
avoid frequent illness. We often blame God for 
what we ought to blame no one but ourselves. If 
one eats unwholesome food, he must expect to have 
an attack of indigestion. The only connection that 
God has with such an attack is that He has ordained 
suffering to follow a violation of the simple rules of 
living. If one sleeps in a room with the windows 
closed down tight, shutting out every breath of cir- 
culating air, why should he hold Providence respon- 
sible for poisoned lungs? If one sits down upon a 
cake of ice, why should he murmur at Providence 
for giving him pneumonia ? Many a casket has been 
carried out to the graveyard and lowered into an 
ugly hole that might have been delayed perhaps for a 
few years, if there had been the exercise of good 
sense for preserving the life. 



DO NOT FRET 215 

I say these things for two reasons; because I like 
to get away from the beaten paths of sermonizing; 
and because I wish you to think of things that are not 
commonly considered. Instead of fretting ourselves 
over what we could probably avoid, if we were to 
try, let us do the best we can, and do that in reliance 
upon God's help. Old Putnam's advice to his sol- 
diers in the Revolutionary War was the very richest 
philosophy. He said to his men, "Trust in God, and 
keep your powder dry !" Faith and works can never 
be successfully divorced. 

III. I apply the words of the text to those who fail 
to look on to the ultimate triumph of God's purposes. 
I like the optimism of this Psalm. Its prevailing 
tone is that of a bugle. You never hear any dirges 
in David's Psalms. Though now and then you listen 
to a note pitched in a minor key, it is soon changed 
into more stirring harmony. So with all the Bible. 
The Scriptures open the windows of the soul towards 
the sunrise. The Word of God is full of hope and 
cheer from lid to lid. It is so filled because it is the 
Word of God. This fact, to my mind, is a strong 
proof of the inspiration of the Bible. If men had 
written this book without divine help, it would have 
been written with a pen of iron; the Holy Spirit 
breathing upon those who traced its paragraphs, it 
has been written with pens of gold, the points of those 
pens flashing with the glory of God. 

"Fret not thyself." You and I, of course, are to be 
concerned for the redemption of the world. The 



216 DO NOT FRET 

text does not teach that we should sit down in idle- 
ness, simply expecting that all wrongs will eventually 
be righted. God and we are in partnership. But 
we are not to chafe ourselves because the world is 
not redeemed in a day. Too many are doing that 
very thing, failing to look on to the victory that is 
surely awaiting the vision. This world, long under 
the tyranny of sin, is to be gloriously emancipated. 
That is an inspiration to earnest fighting. 

God often seems to move slowly in the execution 
of His plans, but He moves surely, nevertheless. 
Men are sometimes impatient. They are like a boy 
at school pushing on the hands of his watch to bring 
a coming holiday. But he does not bring it. The 
great sun in the heavens beyond keeps on its ap- 
pointed way, measuring time as it has been accus- 
tomed to measure it. We cannot hasten God. It is 
for us to wait on Him, working while we wait. It is 
useless to fret. 

At the World's Fair in St. Louis I saw an im- 
mense clock. Its large hands mark the minutes and 
the hours over a dial of variegated plants. I after- 
wards thought of that floral clock as an emblem of 
God's decrees. Although its dial is three hundred 
feet in circumference and one hundred feet in diam- 
eter, it perfectly shows the time of day. Its slow- 
moving indicators are cumbrous in form compared 
with those that travel around the face of a lady's 
chatelaine watch; but they march majestically on 
over a blooming field of numerals, and reach every 



DO NOT FRET 217 

hour of the day with undeviating precision, each 
hour and half hour announced by a bell weighing 
five thousand pounds, the heavy tones of that bell 
sounding for miles. 

Far greater is the clock of God's decrees. It is 
vast beyond comprehension. The sweep of its hands 
is over the circle of eternity. You and I catch only 
a glimpse of those hands as they pause at the little 
points of our lives. With God centuries and millen- 
niums are but single pulse-beats of being. With Him 
human time itself, though it should be extended to 
untold ages, is no more than a spider's web floating 
out from one small section of the arc of everlasting- 
ness. But the stupendous hands on that clock of de- 
crees are steadily climbing on to the hour that is yet 
to strike the moment of heaven's daybreak upon the 
night of the world's sin and shame. When that hour 
peals forth its sonorous strokes, wickedness will flee, 
and hide itself in unending darkness. Therefore, O 
child of God, whoever thou art, "fret not thyself." 



The Serpent's Subtlety 

The serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field. 
Genesis 3:1. 

In the beginning God made a beautiful world and 
gave it a beautiful king and queen. That king and 
queen were created in the image of the King of 
kings and Lord of lords. This royal pair lived in a 
garden palace. Everything pleasing to the eye. Ev- 
erything pleasing to the ear. Everything pleasing to 
the taste. No intense heat to smite the head. No 
chilling blasts to send a shiver through the frame. 
No driving storms to lay waste the trees. By day 
the skies blue and the air shining with sunbeams ; by 
night the same skies aglow with dazzling brilliance 
and that same air agleam with flashes of silver dart- 
ing through its shadows. No sickness ; no pain ; no 
death. Sorrow unknown. The subjects of these 
jointly-reigning monarchs were the birds that fly 
above the earth, the fish that swim in the waters, the 
harmless insects that flutter on diamond-dusted wings 
among the flowers, and all the animals of various 
names, the lions, and tigers, and wolves, and hyenas 
that now roam the forests and jungles and wooded 
hills wild and ferocious, then tame and gentle, often 
coming up to lick the hands of the ones who ruled 
them in love. As made by the Almighty, that world 



THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 219 

was not far from heaven. Angels walked it in com- 
panionship with those who were its king and queen. 
God Himself pressed its paths with His glorious feet. 
That first man and woman were given a fair start, 
and there was before them the prospect of unending 
happiness. They were like a ship launched upon a 
smooth sea and with favoring winds filling the sails. 

But one day that garden palace was entered by a 
foe, his feet black with the smut of perdition. A 
serpent, naturally wise and cunning, was used by Sa- 
tan as a tool of temptation. With its fangs it injected 
the poison of unbelief into the minds of that king 
and queen. It was their first step along a road that 
was alive with serpents. Sin uncrowned them. 
Avenging Justice banished them. They went forth 
from their first blessed home into a wilderness world. 

I once had a strange dream. In boyhood days I 
had read in the "Arabian Nights' Entertainments" 
a story of a fisherman who one day drew up from the 
sea upon his hook a heavy vase of copper. He broke 
the seal of the vessel, supposing that it contained 
something of great value, perhaps gold or silver, per- 
haps diamonds, perhaps pearls. But when he had 
thus broken the seal, there issued from the vase a 
thick smoke, that smoke afterwards solidifying and 
taking on the shape of a gigantic genie, the monster 
threatening to kill the fisherman for giving him lib- 
erty. With that tale impressed upon my mind, I 
dreamed one night that I opened a vase out in a field. 
From that opened vase rose a wreath of black vapor, 



220 THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 

curling and twisting and writhing in air like a ser- 
pent, and then mounting to the skies. Up there it 
spread itself, and became a funnel-shaped cloud that 
swooped down and then went sweeping over the 
land as an agent of terrible destruction. I had let 
loose from that vase an imprisoned tornado! 

Something like this was the result of the serpent's 
temptation in Paradise. From that first act of sin 
followed all the sins that have since cursed the 
world for six thousand years or more. The world 
that once swung near heaven, now swings near helL 
The history of mankind is the trail of a serpent. 

I imagine that when Satan had accomplished his 
diabolical purpose of ruin, he lifted his grimy wings, 
and sped quickly back to his den of darkness, there 
summoning a conference of his fallen companions. 
Seating himself upon his throne of fire, he exclaimed, 
"Hear me, ye fellow-outcasts from the brightness of 
God's face! I have marred Heaven's new work of 
creation. In yonder world there is a palace of beauty 
destroyed. It is the work of these hands of mine in 
obedience to the thought of my subtle brain. Those 
who lived in that palace are now in disgrace, exiles 
forever from all that once was theirs to enjoy. They 
have sinned through a brilliant temptation from my 
wicked tongue. Made in the image of God, they 
have lost their beauty of soul. Behold the one who 
defeated the purpose of Him who turned us into this 
vile abode ! How sweet is this revenge ! Join me at 
this hour in tasting that sweetness!" 



THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 221 

Then I hear the rustling of thousands of wings, 
like the sound of a tempest blowing from the sea, and 
from thousands of burning lips I hear hoarse huzzas, 
like the breaking of storm-lashed waves upon a rocky 
coast. It is the applause of hell over the broken scep- 
tre and tarnished crown and demolished throne of the 
world's first king and queen. 

"Order!" cries Satan. "Hear me again! The 
work is not yet complete. You and I must poison 
man and woman with other temptations. There is a 
possibility that they may recover from their fall. 
They may regain what they have lost. I heard the 
Lord who created them speak of One who should 
bruise the serpent's head. It is for us now to pre- 
vent them from returning to their original state. Let 
the ruins of their palace remain forever. We must 
make devils like ourselves of this sinful pair. Lis- 
ten to me, as I unfold my plans I" 

Then, in my fancy, I see the arch-fiend rise to his 
feet. His throne of fire behind his erect form flames 
forth with a more sullen brightness. His wicked 
face takes on a more wicked look. His audience of 
lost spirits gives silent attention. Satan continues: 

"This man and woman are to be the father and 
mother of uncounted hosts of descendants. Through 
all the centuries of time these populations of the 
earth are to be taught every evil thing that my in- 
fernal brain can invent. I promised that man and 
woman that they should be gods. By all the iniquity 
of my depraved heart, I will keep my promise. My 



222 THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 

purpose is to fill the world with violence and blood- 
shed. You are to help me. So soon as children are 
born to that fallen pair, let one of you go to the 
child whom you think to be a likely subject, carrying 
in your hand from these flames of hell an ember of 
jealousy. Place that ember in that one's heart; then 
with your foul breath blow it, until it snaps and 
sparkles and leaps up into a blaze. Then stand off 
and watch the effect of your work. Why, I already 
see it! Behold, devils, the first murder! See that 
brother lying along the ground slain by a brother!" 

There is deep silence for a moment, broken finally 
by another round of applause. Then one in that au- 
ditory of fiends drowns the applause with stentorian 
voice, shouting, "Long live Apollyon!" That cry 
is taken up by multiplied flaming lips, and the sound 
of it echoes and reechoes among the deepest caverns 
of hell. It roars like an earthquake. 

"Listen!" exclaims the speaker. "Do not think 
that my imagination is carrying me away from my- 
self, but I see yet more. Yonder outstretched form 
is bleeding from the blow that fell upon it. I see that 
blood flowing out over the ground. It writhes. Be- 
hold, it is a red serpent ! I see it creeping on. I fol- 
low its trail. It is joined by other serpents. Lo, 
there is a great multiplication of serpents ! Men are 
beginning to murder each other by wholesale. They 
call that wholesale murder war. Families fight 
against each other. Tribes fight against each other. 
Nations fight against each other. Inspired by me, 



THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 221 

ingenious minds invent many instruments for spill- 
ing blood. They war against each other with bows 
and arrows. By and by they tip their arrows with 
poison. They war against each other with swords 
and spears. They war against each other with guns 
and cannon. I hear the tramp of great armies. I 
see those armies marching on. Their banners fly in 
gorgeous colors in the winds. Their helmets sparkle 
in the sunlight. Their uniforms flash. Men achieve 
fame on the fields of battle. The most distinguished 
men are those who have slain the largest number of 
their fellow-men. Their names are written large in 
history. Then I see fleets of armored vessels riding 
the waves of the seas. Those vessels are floating 
volcanoes. Day and night men plan and think, seek- 
ing to make ships more destructive. Chemistry 
teaches them the art of forming new explosives for 
the hurling of the thunderbolts of war. By me- 
chanical skill they devise more powerful engines of 
warfare. Cities are thrown down. Strong fortifica- 
tions are toppled into the dust. The very bed of the 
lakes and oceans is laid with hidden hells of death. 
All around its mighty circumference the world is 
stained with blood ! Stained with blood ! That blood 
the outcome of envy, and pride, and greed, and ambi- 
tion." 

In my fancy I hear the applause that again greets 
the speech of Satan, and I hear thousands of cries 
that say, "Let us go up to earth and begin this dire- 
ful work!" 



224 THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 

Then Satan responds, "Not yet. I have not done. 
Hear me further in the unfolding of my plans. Men's 
hearts are to be filled with hatred of God, with jeal- 
ousy, with selfishness, with murder, with lust, and 
with every form of wickedness. Their hearts are to 
become fountains of iniquity, spitting forth rotten- 
ness. But I have yet to name one thing that shall 
shadow, and curse, and blast, and destroy the world. 
This one thing is to outrival war in its' effects of 
evil. It will take a man of good disposition 
and change him into a devil. It will sep- 
arate husbands and wives. It will batter 
down happy homes and divide families. It 
will forge and cut the screws of many a coffin lid. It 
will dig many a grave. It will break many a heart. 
It will ruin many a soul. Yonder I see gardens of 
joy in full bloom; this invention of my brain will 
frost and kill every flower within them. Yonder I 
see blue skies that smile with prosperity; this inven- 
tion of my brain will cloud them, and tear them with 
lightnings, and shake them with thunder. Yonder I 
see thousands of sunbeams of happiness; this inven- 
tion of my brain will scatter them. Those sunbeams 
are like troops of visiting angels; they shall give 
place to shadows that are like the furies of hell. Ev- 
erything lovely and beautiful and glorious in the lives 
of men will this one invention of my brain bring to 
ashes. Like war, men will praise it, the minds of 
poets praising it in metric phrase, the minds of ora- 
tors praising it in language exalted, the minds of mu- 



THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 225 

sicians praising it in wondrous tunes, the minds of 
artists praising it in glowing colors upon the canvas, 
the minds of sculptors praising it in creations of 
marble. Great palaces will be erected in its honor. 
It will have the chief place at all worldly banquets, 
clothing the tongues of those who speak with elo- 
quence. It will have full sway at many a wedding 
feast, prompting the wishes of those who gather 
around the wedded pair. It will be the principal 
guest at the launching of many a ship. But wherever 
the feet of this thing shall go, they will leave behind 
them desolation, and woe, and the blackness of dark- 
ness. Under the withering touch of its hands, kings 
and queens, emperors and czars, and presidents and 
legislators, and judges and attorneys and juries will 
lose all sense of righteousness and receive bribes. 
Beneath its bewitching spell politics will be cor- 
rupted. By reason of its blandishments all classes 
and conditions of men will put forth their grasping 
fingers to clutch within them corroding gold and sil- 
ver, blistering their palms with dishonesty and mis- 
erliness." 

Then, in my fancy, I see Satan draw himself to his 
full height of wickedness, as he proceeds with his 
narration of plans for peopling hell with lost souls 
through his invention of evil. Satan continues : 

"Listen, fiends ! I have not done. My brain is in 
a whirl of imagination. Yonder are Adam and Eve 
just beginning their fallen life. But I see their de- 
scendants. Among them are many who are not 
15 



226 THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 

wholly given to badness. But there is something in 
their veins that is like a smouldering fire. They have 
inherited from their forefathers a tendency towards 
self-destruction. See them yonder hanging dead 
from swinging ropes! See them yonder lying dead 
from wounds inflicted by pistols and knives! See 
them yonder stretched dead from eating poison! 
See them yonder floating dead upon the bosom of 
the rivers, having drowned themselves in their mad- 
ness of mind ! One of you fanned that smouldering 
fire in their veins into a blaze and it consumed them. 
Yonder I see mighty men falling under the influence 
of this infernal invention of mine. High in the 
world's seats of fame, they are down in the mire. 
Yonder I see a funeral of a prodigal son who went 
off from his rural home to wallow with human swine 
in the gutters of a large city. There is a streamer of 
black blown by the winds from the door of the farm- 
house. A long line of carriages wheeling slowly up 
the lane. Crowds of mourners. Look at the corpse 
within the casket ! The undertaker has tried to hide 
a cut across the brow, but he was not wholly suc- 
cessful. Here come the old gray-haired father and 
mother to take their last look at the form of the re- 
creant one. The friends respectfully stand back to 
give them room. Heart-breaking sobs, the father 
bending his head down at the rigid feet, his beard 
snowing into the coffin, the mother at the head, her 
blinding tears falling upon the face of her dead boy. 
Oh, how it fills my foul heart with joy to behold that 



THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 227 

scene ! Those tears are nectar. Those sobs and that 
wail from a mother's lips are music to my ears. But 
there is more than one such scene. There are mil- 
lions of them. Look yonder! A happy home. A 
loving husband. A smiling wife. A group of rosy- 
faced and golden-curled children. But look now! 
An unhappy home. A growling, fist-brandishing 
husband. A grief-stricken wife. A throng of af- 
frighted children. Multiply that picture changed, 
and you, my fellow-fiends, will know something of 
the work that is yet to be accomplished by this in- 
vention of mine." 

Again applause rings out in hell. But Satan 
checks it as before, proceeding with his plans for 
blighting further the world that he first blighted 
with a serpent temptation. Satan continues : 

"This thing that I shall teach men to learn will 
have a powerful influence in every century. I will 
teach them, as the ages roll on, more of its forceful 
energy. They will add to its strength, as their knowl- 
edge increases. It will take on more virulence. It 
will often be the inspiration of family feuds. It will 
often be the inspiration of tribal disputes. It will 
often be the inspiration that will unchain the wolves 
of war among the nations. By means of it riches 
shall become poverty, wisdom shall become foolish- 
ness, learning shall become idiocy, pride shall be- 
come indifference, and religion shall become hypoc- 
risy. There will be many means devised by godly 
men and women to stay the influence of this invention 



228 THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 

of mine, but they will for a long time fail. I shall 
so arrange matters that the majority of the earth's 
populations will not listen to the protests of the 
feeble few who shall work against me, that majority 
calling those few hair-brained, calling them insane 
enthusiasts, calling them fanatics, calling them 
cranks. Even ministers who shall preach of the One 
who is to bruise my head, will, in many cases, be 
afraid to speak out what they really believe, fearing 
loss of position, or loss of money, or loss of popu- 
larity. Men in business will hide their real senti- 
ments for fear of suffering in trade. Those holding 
office will be silent lest they be unseated. I will so 
lengthen this serpent that I am to send abroad over 
the face of the earth as to make it long enough to 
twist its folds throughout the whole of human life. 
There shall be no form of life untouched by it. Ser- 
mons against it will be of no avail. Lectures against 
it will die as soon as their echoes die. Scientific dem- 
onstration of the virulence of my invention will fade 
from the memory like a dream. I will have my 
agents in every church aisle, in every court of jus- 
tice, in every hall of medicine. I see many rising 
up in righteous anger against this infernal invention 
of mine for ruining the earth, but I see many more 
aiding in its spread. Laws will sanction it, and make 
it respectable by means of their seal. Those high in 
society will embrace it, becoming examples for the 
low and vicious. In some cases it shall have eccles- 
iastic approval. For thousands of years the world 



THE SERPENT'S SUBTLETY 229 

shall be held close in the folds of this serpent of in- 
iquity born and reared within my burning heart of 
wickedness. Oh, yes ; it will poison mankind with a 
poison for which only the superior power of God 
shall be able to provide an antidote. What I see be- 
fore my eyes thrills me with delight. God's world 
shall be turned into a hell by this invention of mine !" 

Then Satan's assembled auditors cry, "Give us 
the name of this supreme evil, that we may baptize 
it with everlasting darkness !" "I have no name for 
it," is Satan's answer. "I will leave it to men to give 
it a name." 

It seems to me, my friends, that I, your pastor, 
have just awakened from a nightmare. Like Dante, 
the Italian poet, I have been in the depths of perdi- 
tion. I wish that I had his gift of words. But I am 
reminded that this is the World's Temperance Sab- 
bath. The name of the invention about which Satan 
has discoursed to-day in this allegorical sermon of 
mine is ALCOHOL ! 



The Frost 



By the breath of God frost is given. Job Z7 '• *o« 

While there are scholarly men searching the Bible 
to find flaws in it, picking it with pins of destructive 
criticism, it is a part of my mission as a preacher to 
turn over its leaves in quest of unfamiliar texts with 
which to enforce fresh and helpful lessons. Instead 
of finding this Book, as some do, covered with the 
dust and cobwebs of a past usefulness, I find it to be 
the most wonderful book that was ever penned and 
printed. It has withstood many a skeptical assault. 
It will withstand many more. In one single year of 
recent date, the year that was a brother to this pres- 
ent year, over eleven million copies of the Bible were 
sold in England and the United States, those enor- 
mous sales in evidence of the fact that the Bible is 
the most popular of all books with us and our cous- 
ins over the sea. In these same countries, during 
five years of time, the total sales of thirty of the most 
popular novels amounted to less than one year's sale 
of the Bible. What can infidelity do with a book 
like the Bible? Can such a book be destroyed? As 
well attempt to catch the lightnings of an August 
storm with a butterfly net ! As well attempt to draw 
oft" the tides of the Atlantic Ocean with a teaspoon ! 



THE FROST 231 

As well attempt to stop the flow of Niagara's waters 
with a mud-dam thrown up by a child's spade ! 

Out of this treasure-house of divinity I bring you 
to-day a handful of sparkling gems, those gems crys- 
tallized by the breath of God, and those gems being 
the frost that covers the ground in the evenings and 
mornings of the winter season now upon us. "By 
the breath of God frost is given." 

I. I inquire, What is frost ? It is the dew with its 
winter clothes on. It is the first cousin of hailstones 
and snowflakes. It belongs to God's royal family 
of evaporation and condensation. The raindrops 
of an April shower are its brothers and sisters. The 
frost hath kingly birth ; and it always wears a crown. 
It is a prince of the household of the Lord God Al- 
mighty. 

There are just seven references to frost in all the 
Bible from lid to lid. In fact, there are but six ref- 
erences to it, one out of the seven spoken of being 
really a reference to hailstones, the original Hebrew 
word being so> translated in the margin. You know 
the reason, of course, for this paucity of reference 
to what is to us so common a sight. Frost was not 
so frequently seen in the lands described in the Bible. 
Plenty of references to other things in Nature; to 
clouds and thunders and lightnings; to grass and 
trees and flowers; to iron and gold and silver; to 
birds and beasts; but to frost only here and there a 
reference. 

But this scarcity of reference to frost in the Bible 



232 THE FROST 

does not do away with the fact that frost is of di- 
vine origin. My text declares that it is given by the 
breath of God. What a thought that is ! How near 
it brings God to us in the winter season that is now 
upon us ! It is not hard to realize that God is close 
to us in the glad, bright days of the summer. When 
the trees are full-foliaged, their leafy banners keep- 
ing time in their waving under the wind to the mel- 
ody of the birds; when the grass is greening the 
fields and the meadows, that grass embroidered with 
buttercups and daisies ; when the brooks are singing, 
as they run on silver feet to their betrothal to the 
river; when the gardens are all abloom with pansies, 
with geraniums, with ragged-robin, with all classes 
of roses, white roses, pink roses, deep crimson roses, 
their cheeks kissed by the sunbeams of May and 
June, it is not a difficult matter then to see every- 
where the footprints of God, and know that He is 
not far away. But here is a reminder of God's prox- 
imity in the bleakness and barrenness of December, 
of January, of February, of all the months when frost 
is abundant. Listen to the text again! "By the 
breath of God frost is given." 

"The breath of God!" One of the pastimes of 
boyhood days was that of breathing upon a window- 
pane, and watching the moisture of the lungs freeze, 
when there was biting cold on the outside of the 
glass. On a grander scale God breathes upon the 
landscape on a winter's night, and when we awaken 
in the morning and look forth, lo, all the ground is 



THE FROST 233 

white with flashing jewels fired into brilliance by the 
sun ! It is the frost given by the breath of God. 

Another pastime of childhood was that of scratch- 
ing one's name upon the frosted window-glass of the 
home. I have seen boys and girls of a larger growth 
do that same thing upon the windows of a passenger 
coach while traveling. So upon the frost along 
the paths of the woods, and in field and orchard, you 
may find the autograph of God. That signature is 
just as much written in the frost as upon lichened 
rocks, as upon the snowy crests of the mountains, as 
in letters of stars upon the black page of midnight 
skies. What is the use in looking for God only in 
great things? He is not only the God of the stu- 
pendous, but also of the small, a spider's eye con- 
structed by Him with as much care as a flaming con- 
stellation, the path of a minnow through the waters 
as unerring as the roadway of a planet circling 
around the sun, the frost of a winter's night as care- 
fully arranged as the drapery of clouds around the 
ebony cradle of a rainbow born of a storm. 

I once read of a man who went away from home 
in search of diamonds, going a long distance. He 
was gone a great while. In his absence a stranger 
stopped one day at the home, the stranger observing 
that the children were playing on the floor with pe- 
culiar looking pebbles. The visitor examined one of 
those pebbles, afterwards exclaiming to the children, 
"Where did you get these stones?" "Down in the 
brook that belongs to our farm." The stranger hast- 



234 THE FROST 

ened to the brook, finding it paved with the same 
kind of pebbles with which the children were playing. 
Those pebbles were diamonds. The father of the 
household had gone to far-away lands in quest of di- 
amonds, and there were acres of diamonds within 
sight of the smoke of his own chimney! 

So there are many who take a telescope with which 
to see God, when He may be seen on the ground be- 
neath their feet. The frost proclaims Him near. The 
frost is the gems that sparkle on His hand. The 
frost is the product of His breath. 

It strikes me that the most of people need to know 
the nearness of the Lord in the sharp, freezing 
weather of life. There are so many pangs of dis- 
appointment that hurt the heart, so many business 
reverses that blight our prospects, so many difficul- 
ties that make the path of life hard to the feet, so 
many white tombstones that stand at the head of 
graves where sleeps beloved dust, those stones ap- 
pearing as if covered with tears that have congealed 
in the winter of bereavement, the grief-dew of love 
turned into frost, that we need to know just how 
close our Father in heaven is to us. Who would have 
thought that consolation could be pressed out of this 
icy text? But it is there, waiting for the warm hand 
of faith to melt it down into blessed comfort. "By 
the breath of God frost is given." That means that 
God sends our wintry trials. If then He sends them, 
they are sent in token of His love. Frost is the breath 
of God. 



THE FROST 235 

II. I remark, again, that the frost is an evidence 
of God's artistic skill. We are accustomed to the 
pictures that God paints along the walls of autumnal 
forests, or hangs with cords of fire from the two hori- 
zons of the day, or the frescoes that God's brush 
traces upon the canvas of evening skies, so accus- 
tomed to great conflagrations of color on land and 
sea and sky, that we forget to look for the more deli- 
cate skill which God everywhere displays. The frost 
of the winter season bears witness to that skill. Look 
over the ground in the early morning ! The earth is 
covered with white. It is not snow, for it is not 
piled so high as snow often is. The Psalmist said 
that it reminded him of ashes everywhere scattered. 
"He scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes." That is a 
beautiful figure, but, like all other figures, it must 
not be dissected. Ashes are the refuse of combus- 
tion. What the inspired poet referred to was not 
that the frost was a waste product. He was prob- 
ably thinking of the hue of the frost, and of its abun- 
dance. In these respects it was like ashes thrown 
out. But I like to think of the frost as lace-work, 
its white-flowered meshes woven by the same Will 
that weaves the rainbow as a scarf for the dark shoul- 
ders of the storm. The loom in which the frost is 
woven is the breath of God. 

Then, too, look at the frost on the window-panes ! 
There is no human engraving that can equal the en- 
graving of the frost by the breath of God given. 
The rich adorn their mansions with the masterpieces 



236 THE FROST 

of famous artists. But the frost, under the direction 
of divine inspiration, makes even a poor man's win- 
dows a marvelous combination of artistic forms ; gar- 
dens impressed upon those windows, and in full 
bloom of foliage; ferns of rost, daffodils of frost, 
hydrangeas of frost, crysanthemums of frost, great 
clustering roses of frost; and when the sun kisses 
these frosted leaves and blossoms, it is as if every 
kiss were a diamond. Along with the gardens are 
other scenes; scene of hunting, a fox on the run, 
hounds and horsemen in pursuit; scene of palaces 
and thrones and crowns; scene of battle; scene of 
victorious processions; scene of cities with imposing 
architecture, as the sun strikes those cities, setting 
them on fire, until they look like a picture of the last 
judgment, flames in the heavens, men and women 
and children and beasts rushing to find a place of 
safety, angels flying through the air with the vials 
of God's wrath ; the whole scene melting away, as if 
the judgment had passed. Grandeurs and sublimities 
etched in frost upon the commonest piece of window 
glass that ever came from a glass-making establish- 
ment. Those scenes one day rubbed out, the next 
morning repeated ; no one but the infinite God, whose 
breath gives the frost, being able to afford such an 
expenditure of genius. How wonderful is God ! 

What do we learn from God's artistic work of 
frost? This is the work that He displays in the win- 
ter. So it seems to me that it takes the freezing tem- 
perature of adversity often to develop beauty in the 



THE FROST 237 

human soul. Paul in prison ; John Bunyon in prison. 
Do you see the frost on the window-pane? Read 
Paul's glowing epistles that came out of the winter of 
his incarceration in Rome; read John Bunyan's im- 
mortal dream that came out of the winter of his in- 
carceration in Bedford jail. David in exile ; John the 
apostle in exile. Do you see the frost on the ground ? 
Read David's superb Psalms; read John's Apoca- 
lypse. John Milton blind ; Fanny Crosby blind. Do 
you see the frost in those lives? One life that was 
dark writing "Paradise Lost" ; the other life that was 
dark writing hymns that have sung themselves in 
thousands of hearts, one of the best hymns of those 
shaded eyes the hymn that speaks of the rapture of 
seeing Christ face to face in the glory of God's night- 
less city. 

Oh, yes; the frost is a most wonderful artificer, 
producing scenes that the pencil of smiling June 
cannot draw ; also tracing in another realm, the spir- 
itual realm, lines of beauty upon the soul that no sum- 
mer time of prosperity has ever yet attempted even 
to imitate. "By the breath of God frost is given." 
Bless God for frost in the physical world! Bless 
God for frost in the world of the soul ! 

III. I speak again of the frost as medicine. In 
the science of medicine there are remedies classed 
as prophylactic, remedies that prevent disease. Vac- 
cination is a prophylactic against the scourge of 
small-pox. The frost is a divine prophylactic. It is 
made in heaven's laboratorv. You know that there 



238 THE FROST 

are various germicides used to kill the many germs 
that assault human life and threaten its destruction, 
bo uses God the frost. The summer season loads the 
air with impurities, and for the health of mankind 
God gives the frost the mission of removing these im- 
purities. The frost is one of the greatest, if not the 
very greatest, prophylactic measure of our temperate 
zone. Whatever may be your opinion of rival schools 
of medicine, you must admit that God believes in al- 
lopathic doses of this medicine of the frost! Frost 
on the hills. Frost in the valleys. Frost over the 
fields. Frost in the woods. Frost upon the gar- 
dens and orchards. An abundance of frost. All of it 
given by the breath of God. It is God's prophylactic, 
God's germicide. 

We sometimes complain of the chilliness that rides 
down the atmosphere and lays its cold hands upon 
our bodies. Complaining is one of the common habits 
of the race. There are many who complain under 
all circumstances. Nothing is ever exactly right. 
But let us cease complaining about the frost. Let us 
find in it cause for thanksgiving. It is a tonic. How 
a low temperature whips the lazy blood into activity f 
In the summer season many persons become almost 
too languid to talk. But what a change when the 
frosts arrive ! How the eyes brighten ! What brisk- 
ness in the step! What animation in the whole 
frame ! Better than alcoholic stimulants, such stimu- 
lants always reacting, calling for a larger draught the 
next time used; better than any medicine known to 



THE FROST 239 

human science, is this that God gives when His 
breath fills the air with frost. Instead of scolding the 
frost, and frowning at it, we ought to be stirred by it 
into words of thankfulness, making it the subject of 
a doxology. 

Also ought the frost to be an inspiration to the 
life of the soul, correcting the indolence of summer 
months, and sending sluggish spiritual blood in quick- 
ened tides along the arteries. If cold weather would 
drive men and women to church on the Sabbath and 
to the prayer-meeting through the week, gathering 
them to the warmth of the ordinances of God's house, 
there would be many a pastor with a glad heart. 
There is no more dispiriting sight than that of a long 
line of empty pews, or row after row of vacant chairs 
in the sanctuary. Talmage once said that such things 
are non-conductors of Gospel electricity. More than 
that; they are the juniper trees under which heart- 
broken Elijahs sob and weep. O thou Breath of 
God, breathe upon Thy Church everywhere, not 
frosts that kill, but the frosts that will so tingle and 
smart as to draw Thy people to the fires of renewed 
interest in themselves and others ! Let those fires be 
revival fires! 

IV. Once more, I remark, that the frost is a 
preacher. It is an inspired preacher, God's breath 
upon it. I have seen many a time other preachers of 
God in the pulpits of Nature — the white-robed min- 
isters of the springtide orchards ; the rainbow-gowned 
ministers of the gardens ; the ministers that smile in 



240 THE FROST 

sunbeams, and the ministers that weep in summer 
showers. God has many preachers in Nature; and 
they belong to many sects — ministers that are classed 
with ritualism, wearing sacerdotal garments and 
chanting liturgies ; ministers that shout in the winds ; 
ministers that baptize in the waters; and ministers 
that come of good Presbyterian stock. But this 
white-haired and white-bearded preacher of the frost 
is more of a Quaker than anything else, though given 
to the wearing of jewelry, especially when the sun 
is up, but relying altogether upon God for utterance, 
and in quiet tones declaring the counsel of God. 

The message that the frost brings us is of God's 
love. What is the frost? It is not the poisonous 
breath of a foe, but the beneficent breath of a benefi- 
cent God. "By the breath of God frost is given." 

Listen to this one message spoken by this patri- 
archal preacher, that one message outranking all 
others in force and eloquence ! The frost is the white 
blanket that God by His breath spreads over the 
sleeping wheat and plants and bulbs — spreading that 
blanket in the first falling of the shadows of winter 
over all that slumbering life, like a mother caring for 
her little ones, and then kissing them good-night. In 
the golden morning of the springtide that life beneath 
the frost shall again awake and laugh and romp and 
play through all the hours of the summer's day. A 
picture that of God V love for this frosted world of 
ours — frosted by sin. Out of death to come life. Out 
of curse to come blessing. Out of darkness to come 



THE FROST 241 

radiance. Out of frost to come bloom and fragrance. 
Then no more winter, but one long, everlasting sum- 
mer of joy and gladness. 

But how shall this transformation be accom- 
plished? By the manger of Christ around which 
gathered the frosts of a December night more than 
eighteen centuries ago. By the carpenter bench of 
Christ around which gathered the frosts of exile and 
poverty. By the persecution of Christ around which 
gathered the frosts of ecclesiastic bigotry and scorn. 
By the Cross of Christ around which gathered the 
frosts of human hate and devilishness, those frosts 
killing frosts, sending their lancets into the body of 
Christ until the blood spurted, and leaving that body 
in the pallor of death. All these frosts permitted by 
the Lord for the carrying out of His purposes — the 
provision of salvation for ruined mankind; the lift- 
ing of the despair ; the dawning of hope ; the pushing 
back of heaven's gates for the entrance of uncounted 
redeemed souls, those gates twelve in number, and 
each one a solid pearl; and the resurrection of the 
blighted flowers of righteousness into beauty. 

O wonderful love of God by whose breath frost is 
given ! The question that springs out of the closing 
of my sermon is this, Are you taking home to your 
heart, my friend, this last point? Would that every 
unconverted soul in this room to-day might answer, 
"Yes!" — the same breath divine that gives the frost 
of winter melting the hard frost of impenitence 
around every heart into the dew of contrition and 
faith ! 
16 



Spiritual Compulsion 

Compel them to come in. — Luke 14 : 23. 

That sounds like a command to use force. But 
that is not what it means. In the spiritual world 
God has very little use for either battering rams or 
thunderbolts. Men are not to be pushed into the 
kingdom of heaven at the point of a sword, nor 
driven in by a fixed bayonet, nor blown in from the 
mouth of a cannon. Neither are they to be dragged 
in by the hair of the head. Some of the mightiest 
powers in the physical realm are so gentle in their 
touch and influence that we do not notice them. 
The light that rushes earthward from the skies trav- 
els faster than sound. If there were an explosion in 
tHe sun that could be both seen and heard on the 
earth, we should see it eight minutes before the noise 
of it would reach our ears. Yet swift-traveling 
light, moving on its flashing wings so quickly that 
an express train seems like a crawling caterpillar in 
comparison, descends upon our globe so silently as 
not to shake an aspen leaf or disturb the sleep of an 
infant. A Niagara cataract tumbling over the rocks 
awakes many an echo; but the soft snowflakes of a 
winter's day build themselves without noise into 
walls that stop the march of armies and halt trade 
and commerce. Bluster and effectiveness of result 



SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 243 

do not always go together. There is more sound in 
the lighting of a match than in the kindling of a sun- 
rise. 

Let us study for a little while the parable from 
which the text is drawn, and then we can determine 
what the words of the text really mean. A great 
deal of false interpretation of Scripture comes from 
a failure to view Scripture on all sides. 

It is like some blind men of whom I once read. 
They tried to describe an elephant. One felt the ele- 
phant's side, and said that an elephant is like a wall. 
Another one felt of its legs, and said that an ele- 
phant is like a column of a building. Another felt 
its trunk, and said that an elephant is like a serpent. 
If they could have seen an elephant with their eyes 
they would have known what an elephant is. Like 
that, I repeat, are some interpretations of certain 
passages in the Bible. Those passages are blindly 
examined, and wrong conclusions are drawn from 
them. 

In this parable it is said that a certain man made 
a great supper, and sent out a large number of invi- 
tations. Now, there is nothing more embarrassing 
and mortifying than to prepare for the coming of 
guests to one's house and have those guests fail to 
put in an appearance. That is what happened to 
the man of the parable. When the servant went to 
tell those who had been bidden that the supper was 
all ready to serve, they each offered an excuse, de- 
clining to give their presence to the meal. What a 



244 SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 

deep student of human nature Christ was ! This is no 
mere fancy sketch. Such things had many times hap- 
pened. They are still happening. The fact was 
that those invited ones did not wish to sit down at 
that man's hospitable table. But rather than to seem 
wholly lacking in politeness, they offered pretended 
regrets. I wonder how many regrets are real? One 
man had bought a piece of ground, and he must 
needs go and see it. Why, that man had already 
seen the land that he had bought. Men are not such 
fools as that in matters of business. The man's ex- 
cuse was as thin as a spider's web. It let the daylight 
through it. 

Another man had been guilty of the same folly. 
He had bought five yoke of oxen, and he was under 
the necessity of proving the animals. That was a 
reversal of the true order of things. The usual rule, 
as everybody well knows, is to prove a thing before 
purchase, not after the money has been laid down 
or a check for the amount drawn and handed over. 
Another spider-web excuse. Even coated thickly 
with the dust of falsehood, it could not shut out the 
daylight. 

Another man urged that he had taken himself a 
wife, and for that reason he could not attend the 
banquet. But that could not have been a real hin- 
drance. In that case, the one who made the supper 
would have included the wife in the invitation, the 
more especially as she was a bride. What could have 
been more natural than for the husband to have said, 



SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 245 

"My dear, we have been asked to a supper this even- 
ing. The invitation comes from one of high stand- 
ing in society. If we go, we shall gain recognition 
at the very beginning of our married life among the 
upper classes. Get yourself ready, and we will go." 
Under those circumstances, the honeymoon being in 
its first quarter, the bride would have sweetly and 
gracefully yielded to the wishes of her husband and 
gone with him to the banquet. That would have 
been too great an opportunity to be missed. 

There were other excuses offered that are not men- 
tioned in the parable. These three are representa- 
tives of all the rest. They were all of the same kind. 
Their prominent characteristic is flimsiness. A blind 
man could almost see through them. 

Now, before we proceed further in this study, I 
wish you to notice that Christ uses these excuses as 
types of the excuses that many hearts offer for not 
accepting God's rich provision of grace in the Gos- 
pel. I do not care what excuse you give, my friend, 
for not being a Christian, whether it be the inconsis- 
tencies of those who are already in the Church, or the 
seeming hardness of some Bible doctrines, or lack of 
time, or what not, your excuse is not sincere. It will 
not stand the scrutiny of truth. You have wrapped 
it up in tissue paper. You cannot hide your heart 
from the eyes of God. Even if that heart of yours 
were placed in the middle of a piece of granite ten 
feet square, those lightning eyes would reach it in 
its concealment. Whatever be your excuse, God 



246 SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 

knows that your real reason for not accepting His 
grace is that you do not want it. That makes your 
excuse all the more hypocritical. Aye, it brings upon 
you the crime of murder. At the judgment-seat of 
God you will lift up a pair of hands all stained with 
the Saviour's blood. Rejecting God's grace is a 
much more serious matter than that of declining an 
invitation to a banquet. It is to turn from the door 
of your heart your very best Friend. It is to crucify 
the Son of God afresh and put Him to an open 
shame. 

When the servant returned with his adverse re- 
port, the man who had made the supper was ruffled 
in mind. The parable puts it even more strongly 
than that, saying that he was angry. Who would not 
have been? I can see him yonder, as he listens to 
his servant's recital. "What!" he exclaims. "Am I 
awake or dreaming? Here I have gone to this ex- 
pense for those whom I counted my friends, and on 
all sides I am met by rude, discourteous rebuffs. 
Well, I am not going to be defeated by a few fools. 
Here, man, go out quickly into the streets and lanes 
of the city, and bring in hither the poor, and the 
maimed, and the halt, and the blind. I am not 
going to be made a laughing-stock by a set of num- 
skulls." 

Let us pause again in the unfolding of the parable 
for a lesson that suggests itself by the way. What 
do we learn? Why, it does not require any unusual 
depth of brain to understand that the grace of God 



SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 247 

is something that puts joy into human life. From 
Christ's own lips we have the statement that religion 
is a banquet. Some consider it to be a funeral, as if 
it is a possession of the soul that kills a man's glad- 
ness, leaving a downward curve of the lips, and the 
dampness of grief coming out from the eyes. The 
common impression is that to become a Christian 
is to move out of the sunlight into everlasting 
shadow; that it is to make a change in one's resi- 
dence from a thronged highway into a graveyard; 
that it is to leave the temperate zone for the frigid; 
that it is to pour into the sweetness of life's cup a 
gill or more of vinegar, the acidity of the mixture 
turning the whole draught sour. But that is one of 
Satan's blackest lies, wrapped up in the folds of ten 
midnights. The more persons the devil can get to 
believe such a dense falsehood, the more laughter 
rings out in hell. Which one will you believe, Satan 
or Christ? Christ says that becoming a Christian is 
to sit down to a table loaded with good things. Re- 
ligion is a banquet. 

Where is there a brighter place than at a scene 
of festivity? Sometimes such a scene is on the oc- 
casion of a birthday anniversary. Friend greets 
friend. One warm hand clasps another warm hand. 
One smiling face looks into another smiling face. The 
guests seat themselves at the festal board. Flashing 
lights. Through the air steals the fragrance of 
flowers. To the nostril ascends the odor of palatable 
food. Upon the table the orchards have thrown 



248 SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 

kisses of fruit. Sparkling silver. Glistening cut 
glass. Pleasant conversation. Brilliant repartee, 
riappy intercourse. Or sometimes such a scene is 
on the occasion of a wedding. A few tears perhaps 
from one pair of eyes, those of the mother of the 
bride, the father keeping his tears back, vigorously 
using his handkerchief, and complaining of a sudden 
cold, but those tears like an April shower with the 
sun shining through the raindrops, the mother re- 
membering her own joy of thirty or forty years be- 
fore. Plenty of parted lips in the facial gesture of 
delight. Congratulations offered. The bride's cake 
cut with merriment. Good wishes sent across the 
table. Gladness written along every face. And if 
now and then a tear comes out again upon the moth- 
er's cheek, it is only a comma or semicolon of pearl 
punctuating the happiness. 

Yes ; religion is a banquet. Christ Himself so de- 
scribes it. I do not care to hear anybody talk about 
religion as though it were anything else than joyous. 
Away with whining prayers ! Away with lugubrious 
tones when speaking of the kingdom of God ! Away 
with sanctimonious rolling of the eyes in inviting 
men and women to Christ! Our God has a great 
many beautiful daughters. He is the Father of a 
large family. The sunrise is one of those daughters. 
The sunset is another one. The rainbow is another. 
The spring is another. The autumn is an- 
other. They live in earth and air and sea 
and sky. Glorious daughters of God! But 



SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 249 

the sweetest-lipped and the fairest faced daughter of 
all is religion. Solomon says, and he knew, for he 
had formed an intimate acquaintanceship with both 
her and that child of hell, worldly pleasure, and is 
therefore competent to give an unbiased opinion — 
Solomon says, "Her ways are ways of pleasantness, 
and all her paths are peace." A greater than Solo- 
mon here to-day declares that this daughter of God is 
so radiantly handsome that it takes a banquet to de- 
scribe her. 

O, my friend why will you stay out upon the ash- 
heaps of this world when you might be a happy 
guest at the table of the King? Religion is good for 
the body ; it is good for the mind ; it is infinitely good 
for the soul. Balm for wounds. Knowledge for ig- 
norance. Everlasting blessedness for misery and de- 
spair. To become a Christian is to stop feeding on 
husks and satisfy one's self with the sweet, nourish- 
ing bread of heaven. To become a Christian is to 
leave the swine-pens of beggary for the wardrobes 
of the Father's house. To become a Christian is to 
take the feet from sin's hard and thorny road and 
place them under the banqueting table of God's love. 

Resuming the narrative of the parable, after the 
servant had followed his master's directions, bring- 
ing in to the supper the various classes described, he 
said, "Lord, it is done as thou hast commanded, and 
yet there is room." Then said the master to his ser- 
vant, "Go out into the highways and hedges and com- 
pel them to come in, that my house may be filled." 



250 SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 

Do you not see the meaning of that, dear friend? 
In your stubbornness of will and hardness of heart 
you may persistently refuse the offers of God's grace, 
but your attitude of indifference is not going to frus- 
trate that grace in other directions. Even after 
large numbers have been gathered to the banquet of 
God's love, there will be found an abundance of room 
for many more. More than human arithmetic can 
reckon. Ten thousand times ten thousand and thou- 
sands of thousands. What stupendous figures ! A 
great multitude that no man can number. The high- 
ways and hedges of the world are already being 
searched for guests to sit down at that table of the 
Gospel. God's servants are abroad upon all the con- 
tinents with invitations to the people. At the deluge 
there was only one family of eight persons saved 
from the wrathful waters that rose above the moun- 
tain-tops; all the rest of the world lost. But in the 
final count of heaven's census by means of the math- 
ematics of God's infinite brain, it will be found that 
there will be far more of the redeemed than of the 
damned. Oh, yes; you may oppose God's invitation 
to His supper of grace ; but you cannot balk His pur- 
poses. That banquet shall yet have many a table pro- 
vided with guests, and there will be no flush of em- 
barrassment upon the cheeks of the Host. Oh, come 
to-day to the Christ ! Be numbered with the throngs 
of the redeemed ! Yet there is room ! 

But what now is the meaning of the phrase, "Com- 
pel them to come in?" That, I take it, is a divine 



SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 251 

direction to ministers of the Gospel and other ser- 
vants of God. Are men and women then to be forced 
into the kingdom of God? I will answer that ques- 
tion by asking another one. How much force would 
it require to make a crowd of poor people go to a 
dinner or supper provided by the long purse of a man 
of wealth ? In some cities, in the winter season, soup- 
houses are provided, to which those in want may go 
for a substantial meal of soup and bread. One of the 
vivid recollections of my very early boyhood days is 
that of the sight of such persons going to establish- 
ments of that kind in Philadelphia. I had the time 
and the opportunity for sights of that character, that 
being one of my pleasures during convalescence from 
a severe attack of scarlet fever. They passed the 
windows of my home every day. I saw them going 
with bowls, with kettles, and with tin cans. No po- 
liceman's club drove them along the street. No bay- 
onets pushed them on. No pistols were pointed at 
them. Their want and hunger compelled them to go. 

So, says the rich man of the parable, "Compel them 
to come in. Go out into the highways and hedges, 
and let the famishing multitudes know that there is 
a place and plenty of room in my house, and that I 
have prepared a supper to which they are welcome, 
and their very necessity will urge them to come in 
and satisfy themselves with my generosity." 

Under such circumstances there would be no oc- 
casion for the use of violence. The fact is that 
Christian work requires gentle tact in making it ef- 



252 SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 

fective. We are to be careful how we give invi- 
tations to the banquet of the Gospel. The main thing 
is to compel men and women to attend to the needs 
of the soul by showing them their need. Many ser- 
mons are a dead failure because they are so clouded 
with metaphysics or the technicalities of theology 
that those who listen cannot see their meaning. About 
the poorest place in all the world to build a fog-bank 
is in a pulpit. We ministers should come down from 
off our scholastic stilts and address the people in the 
language with which they are familiar. Christ stood 
on a level with His audiences. It is safe to follow 
His example. Him the common people heard gladly. 

So is a great deal of what passes for Sabbath- 
school instruction a failure, and for the reason that it 
is lifelessly presented. So do many exhortations in 
evangelistic meetings fall to the ground, and be- 
cause they are made up of pious platitudes. I can 
imagine the servant of the parable going out to the 
beggars of the road, and by his earnest and hearty 
manner persuading them of the reality of the feast 
provided for them. In that way he compelled them 
to go in. 

There is a work for all of us to do in compelling 
sinners. Ministers and missionaries and Sabbath- 
school teachers and other special helpers cannot do 
all the work. It was never intended that they should 
do it all. In fact, every Christian is a servant of the 
King, and is charged with the responsibility of try- 
ing to save souls. Some are gifted in one way, and 



SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 253 

some are gifted in other ways. Whatever your gift, 
my friend, you are to use it in this gently compul- 
sory way suggested by the text. Some can sing. Let 
them do that. Some can write letters. Let them 
wield a consecrated pen. Some have a magnetism 
of person that makes them influential in other direc- 
tions. Let them employ their persuasive manner for 
Christ. 

But there is one thing we can all do, and that is 
lead a life that is so thoroughly Christ-like that it will 
compel assent to the reality of religion. The very 
best argument in all the world in behalf of Christian- 
ity is a clean, square, honest, blameless life. That is 
an argument that weighs more than a thousand treat- 
ises on apologetics; and for the reason that only a 
few persons ever read works on theological science. 
But everybody reads a Christian. 

I also believe in the power of prayer for compell- 
ing the salvation of the lost. We do not make enough 
of this spiritual power. Yet that is the very power 
that has frequently been employed in bringing about 
revivals of religion. It was prayer that took hold of 
three thousand souls on the day of Pentecost and 
moved them irresistibly into righteousness. It is 
the prayers of God's people that will yet shake this 
world of ours out of sin into salvation. The prayer 
"Thy kingdom come" is bound to be answered. Be- 
hind the stars is the dawn. Back of the dawn is the 
sunrise. 

How many of you will regard yourselves as the 



254 SPIRITUAL COMPULSION 

servants of the King, and serve Him in the very best 
way that you can in filling His banqueting house of 
the Gospel. Millions have been brought in during all 
the ages. But there is room for millions more. No 
fear of overcrowding that festal hall. It has a wide 
doorway. Even a multitude thronging it at one time 
could not overcharge its space. One of the door 
posts of that entrance on one side is "Whosoever," 
and the other door post on the opposite side is "Will." 
"Whosoever will I" That is an entrance wide enough 
for the admission of the whole world at one time. 

Oh, let us feel upon us now, as never before, the 
obligation of helping to save the lost! Let us by 
words of invitation through the mouth or pen, by ex- 
ample, by public and private prayer, compel the sin- 
ners around us to press into the feast of the Lord. 
To see them coming, and to see them seating them- 
selves at the Lord's table — that will be itself a ban- 
quet for our own souls. There could be no grander 
sight on earth for either pastor or people. There 
could be no richer banquet, even though the viands 
that graced the feast of an Ahasuerus, or a Belshaz- 
zar, or a Solomon were upon the board. At such 
banquets the angels of God fold their wings and sit 
down. They are banquets of joy. 



Nine-Tenths 

(thanksgiving sermon.) 

Were there not ten cleansed? but where are the nine? 
Luke 17 : 17. 

It was a day of thanksgiving on the outskirts of a 
little village between Samaria and Galilee. No em- 
peror's edict or no governor's proclamation had ap- 
pointed it. That day of thanksgiving was for ten 
men who had been miraculously cured of leprosy. 
But only one of those men saw fit to observe it. This 
single man was one of whom, according to the popu- 
lar thought of the times, much was not to be ex- 
pected. He was a Samaritan. Yet he was the only 
one who opened his heart and poured out its treas- 
ures at the feet of Him who had wrought his won- 
drous cure. The other nine were Jews. 

That day of thanksgiving had been ordered from a 
higher source than from beneath the pen of one who 
sat upon Caesar's throne or occupied a gubernatorial 
chair. It had been fixed by what should be a regnant 
principle within every human soul — Gratitude. Nine 
of those men deliberately chose to despise the man- 
date of that royal principle and hush its kingly voice. 
When only one of the group came back to speak his 
thanks upon the ears of his divine Benefactor, Christ 
asked the pathetic question of the text, "Were there 
not ten cleansed ? but where are the nine ?" 



256 NINE-TENTHS 

No argument against ingratitude, however well 
reasoned or skillfully worded, could surpass this liv- 
ing illustration of that theme. For myself I always 
prefer a picture to logic. Many have the same pref- 
erence. Often a cartoon in a newspaper outweighs 
the thoughts heavily expressed upon its editorial 
page. To the wizard pen of Thomas Nast must be 
given the credit of bringing to judgment the notor- 
ious Tweed gang of years ago in the city of New 
York. So this breathing, palpitating, walking por- 
trayal of selfish unthankfulness is of more worth than 
a whole library on the same subject. Let us study it 
this morning. 

I. We learn from this incident that ingratitude is 
a common fault among mankind. That small group 
of healed lepers is representative of the human race. 
It is the whole world sifted. Nine- tenths of the 
earth's mighty populations have but little or no spirit 
of real thankfulness. 

Do you say that this is a sweeping statement? So 
it is. I do not deny the fact. But look for the proof 
of that assertion in the conduct of those nine Jews 
back there in the first century of this present era. 

Those men had been cured of a most terrible dis- 
ease. Their bodies were the tramping ground of 
leprosy. What is leprosy? It is a most virulent ail- 
ment. It begins to show itself first upon the skin, 
white patches gathering there, those patches after- 
wards developing into running sores. The man af- 
flicted with leprosy becomes a mass of living rotten- 



NINE-TENTHS 257 

ness, all the surface of his body covered with putrid 
eruptions. These pustular excrescences then eat 
their way into the innermost tissues, attacking the 
joints, the blood vessels, the muscles, the nerves, ev- 
erything on the inside and outside of its victim, until 
finally every part of the frame is literally consumed 
by gangrene. Leprosy is an enemy that shows no 
quarter. It is a pirate that does not rest content 
until it lays its wasting hand upon every precious 
thing belonging to one's vitality, and floats its black 
flag in triumph over ruin, afterwards burning its 
prize clear to the water's edge, and leaving it as the 
sport of the winds and waves. In plain words, lep- 
rosy is sure death, a horrible death, a ghastly death. 

That was the loathsome disease of which those 
nine men had been cleansed. They had been walking 
to the grave ; by a word from the Saviour's lips they 
turned and walked into roseate health, postponing 
their funeral. 

Besides that; leprosy made a man in those days a 
social nuisance. Afflicted with a highly infectious 
disease, he had to be quarantined. Lepers were an 
isolated class of people, and by everybody shunned. 
As misery is said to love company, lepers often lived 
together in communities of their own. They had the 
freedom of the roads, but when approaching anyone 
the law compelled them to give warning of their pres- 
ence by crying out, "Unclean! Unclean!" They 
were to be avoided, contact with them being a men- 
ace to one's personal safety. To be a leper was to be 
17 



258 NINE-TENTHS 

a venomous snake. He was an outcast from society, 
often pitied, but pitied with disgust. 

Out of that dreadful state Christ delivered ten men 
all at once. On the outskirts of a little village by 
the way He saw them. They "stood afar off," as 
they were forced to do by the stern law of the day. 
Upon the Saviour's ears rang their plaintive cry, 
"Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!" that cry issuing 
from cracked tongues and ulcered lips, and the very 
breath that sent it through the air loaded with pesti- 
lence. Christ's answer was immediate and powerful. 
He simply said to them, "Go show yourselves unto 
the priests." That meant that they were cured, the 
scrutiny of the priest being a provision of the Leviti- 
cal law governing such cases, the law requiring the 
scrutiny before they could return to the liberty of 
citizenship. In no other way could their quarantine 
be lifted. "Go shew yourselves unto the priests," 
was therefore the prescription with which this divine 
Physician wrought the cure of those men. As they 
passed on in obedience to the Master's command, they 
found that they were healed. At once, before seeking 
his priest, one of them "turned back, and with a loud 
voice glorified God, and fell down on his face, giving 
him thanks." But the other nine hurried on, seem- 
ingly with not a single spark of gratitude within 
their hearts. "And Jesus answering said, Were there 
not ten cleansed ? but where are the nine ?" 

"Well," says some one, "how does this prove the 
statement so sweepingly made, that nine-tenths of 



NINE-TENTHS 259 

humanity are ungrateful?" Why, in this fact, that 
those nine men did not think it worth their while 
to show even common decency in the matter of giving 
voice to thankfulness. They went back to their bus- 
iness, to the pleasures of social life, to their families, 
and to the rights of citizenship, as if they deemed 
their wondrous cure to be no more than what they 
ought to have received at the hands of Christ. If 
that is not the attitude of nine-tenths of earth's 
throngs towards the blessings of God, then I am a 
poor student of human nature and a loose observer of 
the habits of men. On that day of thanksgiving 
long ago gratitude was a scarce article. The propor- 
tion of it was one against nine. There is the same 
rarity of the same article now. Let Jesus Christ 
come down into the United States on this annual 
Thanksgiving Day of the nation, and visit the vari- 
ous churches opened in response to Presidential proc- 
lamation, and there would come from His quivering 
lips the lament of the text, "Where are the nine?" 
In the cities the custom on Thanksgiving Day is for 
several congregations to unite in service. Why? 
Because of the nine, the majority, who have no in- 
cense of thankfulness to burn upon the altar of their 
hearts. It takes several churches to make one re- 
spectable group of worshipers on that day. Nine- 
tenths of the people are elsewhere. 

II. Again, we learn from the text, that we should 
be thankful for daily blessings. Where did those 
nine ingrates get their health? It came to them 



260 NINE-TENTHS 

through the power of Christ, that Christ being God 
manifest in the flesh. The same God is the source 
of all benefits. 

I was reading of the famous musician Haydn. Sick 
and weary and worn, he was carried for the last time 
into a hall of music. There he listened to the ren- 
dering of his own oratorio, the "Creation." When 
the orchestra came to the noted passage in the score 
which harmoniously says, "Let there be light!" it is 
said that the whole audience rose up and cheered and 
cheered. Then Haydn waved his hand toward 
heaven, and exclaimed, "It comes from there! It 
comes from there!" 

That great genius of melody had the right thought. 
The inspiration with which he wrote his masterpiece 
was God-given. It came from above. That is where 
everything good comes from. God is the fountain 
of every gift that flows into every life. 

The trouble with nine-tenths of humanity is that 
they do not perceive the divinity of what are called 
the common blessings of life. Many become so ac- 
customed to receiving favors at the hands of God 
that, like those nine lepers healed, they fail of grati- 
tude. Who thanks God for the air he breathes with 
every rising of his lungs? Who thanks God for the 
water he drinks? Who thanks God for sunrise and 
sunset and the starry pomp of the night, and the eyes 
with which he beholds such splendor of color and 
such an aggregation of flashing magnificence? Who 
thanks God for woodland pictures painted by the 



NINE-TENTHS 261 

fiery brush of autumn? Who thanks God for the 
thousands of every-day beauties that come within 
the sweep of the vision? Who thanks God for the 
multitudinous sounds that greet the ear with music? 
Why, there is enough in one's own body to awaken 
thankfulness, if he would but stop to consider the 
blessings that God has there stored. Here and there 
a soul is vibrant with gratitude for daily gifts; but 
many souls, alas! are silent, their harp-strings un- 
touched by the fingers of a single thanksgiving. 

But let God withdraw His daily blessings. Let 
Him banish the sunbeams ; let Him dry up the brooks 
and rivers and lakes and oceans ; let Him take off His 
care from these frames in which we live, frames that 
need much attention, food for renewing their tissues, 
oxygen for supplying the blood with the elements of 
life, sleep for repairing the waste of hours passed 
in activity; let God sit yonder upon His throne, and 
be stolidly indifferent towards the world ; what would 
follow? What would have followed, if Christ had 
been unresponsive to the prayer of those lepers? 
They would have gone on as they were, the vise of 
death pressing them more and more, and finally 
pinching their diseased hearts into a little lump of 
rottenness for the grave. So would we die, were it 
not for the constant and unremitting goodness of 
God. From our first cry as a babe down to our last 
respiration as a man or woman we are the subjects of 
God's care. Blessings daily ; blessings hourly ; bless- 
ings with every beat of the pulse of life. 



262 NINE-TENTHS 

I find no fault with a national day of thanksgiving. 
Such a day is appropriate. I wish that it might be 
more widely observed. But every day ought to be a 
thanksgiving day. In a world in which there is so 
much of ingratitude, let not you and me be numbered 
with the unthankful nine-tenths. 

III. Again, we learn here that we should be thank- 
ful for many things that we do not have. Reading 
about those poor outcasts in this incident, I am deeply 
thankful that I have no such disease as leprosy in 
my body. The fact is, the most of persons do not 
think enough of their negative blessings. But such 
blessings are just as real and beneficent as are the 
blessings that are positive. If our hearts were in 
proper tune, we should be thankful with almost every 
breath for hundreds of things that do not touch us. 
Some years ago I saw a man in a railroad station who 
was afflicted with paralysis agitans, or shaking palsy. 
As I saw his trembling form, I lifted my heart to 
God, saying, "Father, I thank Thee for sound 
nerves !" 

So we may thank God, if we are not blind or deaf. 
So may we thank God, if we have never been in an 
accident on the rails or on the waters. So may we 
thank God, if we have never been burned out of house 
and home; or if that has been our experience, we 
may thank Him that we were not ourselves hurt by 
the flames. So may we thank God, if we have no 
taint of alcoholism in our veins. Plenty of things 
for which to be thankful. If nine-tenths of humanity 



NINE-TENTHS 263 

would stop grumbling because they are unblessed 
with what they imagine would increase their happi- 
ness, and pause to think of all that they ever escaped, 
they would find that they have abundant subjects of 
praise. I suppose that those nine men of this narra- 
tive had many a murmur upon their ulcerated lips 
against what they considered to be the partiality of 
Providence; but when God stepped in and freed 
them from their loathsome disease, they had no grati- 
tude for exemption from leprosy, that exemption 
making them like the multitudes whom they before 
envied. Christ's question, "Where are the nine?" is 
yet vibrating its pathos in the air of earth. 

Thanksgiving, my friends, is something more than 
a national affair for once a year. It is well to be 
grateful for a big country on whose possessions the 
sun never sets, for untold wealth in our hills, for mil- 
lions of acres that bring forth wheat and corn and 
potatoes in unstinted measure, and for a marvelous 
prosperity that dazzles the eyes of all the world. I 
fear that there is not enough of real thankfulness for 
our unrivalled privileges as a people. But there are 
other things for which to be thankful. Our God 
has given us much stock in His stupendous enter- 
prises, and He declares dividends every moment of 
our lives. Among these dividends are numerous 
blessings that are not ordinarily estimated at their 
true value. 

Negative blessings can be viewed as positive bless- 
ings. The plate upon which a photographer takes a 



264 NINE-TENTHS 

portrait, when developed is called a negative. With 
that negative he prints his pictures, the camera re- 
versing the true, black things being white and white 
things black ; but in the process of printing from that 
reversed negative the paper shows the reality. So 
may our negative blessings be made to impress them- 
selves upon the heart as matters for which to be 
thankful. When so impressed they become the oppo- 
sites of negatives. My advice to everybody is that 
they take down their negatives from the shelves of 
life, brush the dust from them, and put them out in 
the sunlight of God's grace, printing from them pic- 
tures of beauty. This would be a fine exercise for 
those who think that they have but little or nothing 
at all for which to be thankful. 

IV. Again, we may learn that we should be grate- 
ful for our trials. I do not know why those nine 
men had been afflicted with leprosy. Often that dis- 
ease was the direct outcome of sin. Miriam, the sis- 
ter of Moses, was thus visited. So was Gehazi, Eli- 
sha's covetous servant. Leprosy in the Bible is a 
graphic illustration of the virulence and deathfulness 
of sin. But whatever was the cause of their affliction, 
those nine men were given many an opportunity to 
show patience and resignation under suffering. I 
have no reason for believing that they used those op- 
portunities, their conduct afterwards revealing the 
fact that they were far from being in a high state of 
spiritual development. But that does not alter the 
truth that they had the means for rising Godward. 



NINE-TENTHS 265 

If, my friend, you have met with loss, or been in 
frequent pain, or shed many a tear of grief or be- 
reavement, and if these things have made you better, 
is not that sufficient cause for praising the Lord ? In 
that case your loss was gain; pangs of body were 
pleasures; griefs were joys; opened graves were 
doors thrown back that let the glory of a deathless 
city stream in upon your soul. 

What illustrious company you are in to-day ! You 
are sitting down at God's banqueting table of love 
with such distinguished persons as Abraham, and 
Jacob, and Job, and David, and Peter, and Paul, and 
Luther, and Calvin, and Knox, and Wesley, and a 
whole shining host whose names I have not the time 
to mention. As you lift the chalice of thanksgiving 
to your lips from that board, can you not say, as 
some of its contents of mercy spill upon the snowy 
cloth, "My cup runneth over?" 

Oh, yes; you and I have much to be thankful for, 
if our trials have been the rungs of a ladder by which 
we have mounted closer to God. Woe to those whom 
trouble sours! Woe to those whom trouble pitches 
headlong into darkness! Woe to the ungrateful 
nine! 

Why, even our trials might have been worse. That 
is something for gratitude, I am sure. I once read 
of an old lady, who had only two teeth. She said she 
was thankful that those two remaining teeth were 
opposite each other, one in the upper jaw, the other 
directly underneath. That was the right spirit. Two 



266 NINE-TENTHS 

teeth were better than none at all ; and their position, 
favorable for chewing, was an added blessing. Noth- 
ing so bad that it might not be worse. A night with- 
out any stars silvering its shadows is worse than a 
night that heaven illuminates with sun-lamps and 
world-tapers. Plenty of reasons for thankfulness, if 
we have the mind to search for them. Those nine 
men deserved to have their leprosy returned to them. 
What would nine-tenths of humanity deserve, if they 
should get justice instead of mercy from God? 

V. Once more, we may learn that we should be 
thankful for eternal life. That one grateful man of 
the narrative I now place in the foreground of the 
picture we are studying. I think we are warranted 
in believing that he received that day, not only a 
cleansed body, but also a cleansed soul. I gather that 
from what Jesus said to him, the Master's words be- 
ing, "Arise, go thy way; thy faith hath made thee 
whole." 

That was not the mere pronunciation of physical 
wholeness. The other nine who did not come back 
had the same blessing. Christ's words went in and 
found the man's soul. Those words opened to this 
Samaritan the gates of pearl. 

Friends, you and I should have full gratitude for 
the blessings of the Gospel. Even if there were noth- 
ing else for which to be thankful, which is not the 
case, I bless God to-day for the sky-song of angelic 
choristers announcing Jesus born in Bethlehem, and 
the swinging lantern of star that guided Gentiles to 



NINE-TENTHS 267 

His lowly dwelling. I bless God to-day for the Christ 
who healed those lepers of the text and hundreds 
more of the needy in His day, His miracles of mercy 
typical of a richer mercy in delivering untold throngs 
from the foulness of sin. I bless God to-day for the 
footprints of Christ left centuries ago under Eastern 
clouds, those footprints showing the path of the 
grandest Character who ever walked the highways of 
earth, and those footprints revealing a love that hu- 
man language cannot measure. So do I bless God to- 
day for what now beams upon my vision. What is it ? 
Behold it yonder ablaze with the glory of sacrifice 
and redemption ! It is the Cross of the Lamb of God. 
That Cross is the gateway of life immortal for lost 
and ruined man. Gather around that Cross, Amer- 
ica, Europe, Asia, Africa, the islands of the sea! 
Then let rise from millions of lips this song of 
thanksgiving: "Lo, this is our God; we have waited 
for him, and he will save us: this is the Lord; we 
have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in 
his salvation!" Ye angels of heaven, hush your 
notes ! Let that song rise to the ears of God unhin- 
dered ! 



The Lifted Christ 

As Moses lifted up the .serpent in the wilderness, even so 
must the Son of man be lifted up. John 3 : 14. 

George Whitefield preached in his day to thou- 
sands of persons at one time, often out under the blue 
sky, no building being large enough to accommodate 
the crowds that attended his ministry. In a later day 
Charles Haddon Spurgeon also preached to vast mul- 
titudes in the city of London. So did T. DeWitt 
Talmage address great throngs in his immense 
Brooklyn Tabernacle, and, through the press, reach- 
ing millions of souls every week whose faces he never 
saw. But here is a masterly sermon delivered to an 
audience of one person by the most wonderful 
preacher that ever lived. Christ frequently cast His 
marvelous thoughts among a large concourse of 
people, on one occasion His congregation number- 
ing five thousand souls. It is said that there were 
five thousand men present, not counting the women 
and children. If, as is usually the case, the women 
exceeded the men in point of numbers, what a tre- 
mendous auditory that must have been ! But Christ 
also often had only one person to listen to His words. 
That is what happened in this present instance. But 
to have missed having that sermon reported would 
have been to have a blank page in John's Gospel. To 



THE LIFTED CHRIST 269 

Nicodemus that night Christ opened the very richest 
vein in the mine of heavenly truth, sinking His shaft 
deep, and showering upon His hearer double hand- 
fuls of sparkling nuggets of gold. 

Some of the theological doctors have wrangled 
about the case of Nicodemus. They have not agreed 
in their diagnosis. Some have thought his symp- 
toms betokened one thing, and some another. But 
whatever the motives they attribute to this man in 
seeking Christ that night, I have long held to the 
opinion that he was a sincere inquirer. Cowardly he 
may have been, or politic, or conservative, or any- 
thing at all. I do not care. It is my firm belief 
that he was thoroughly in earnest. Why do I so be- 
lieve ? Do you think that Christ would have talked as 
He did, if Nicodemus had not really wished to know 
about the salvation of his soul? Christ told Nico- 
demus that night some mighty truths that He had 
not yet revealed to His own disciples. There in that 
room, right before the eyes of Nicodemus, He pic- 
tured the Cross, and Himself hanging on that Cross 
as the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the 
world. 

Nicodemus went out under the throbbing stars 
that night, and back to his own home, a changed 
man. The grace of God had melted the ice of Phar- 
isaic formality around his heart and made him a fol- 
lower of the young Rabbi whose name was Jesus 
Christ. We afterwards find him, as a member of the 
Jewish Sanhedrin, protesting against the pre-judg- 



270 THE LIFTED CHRIST 

merit of Jesus by the chief priests and Pharisees who 
had sent officers to arrest Christ. We find him again 
at the Cross with Joseph of Arimathea, tenderly car- 
ing for the dead body of the Lord, bringing a hun- 
dred pounds of a mixture of myrrh and aloes for the 
embalming of the mutilated corpse, having a big 
purse, and his heart as big as his bank account. 

Oh, if men and women would only consent to 
talk upon this great subject of the soul's salvation, 
instead of listening to sermons, and then immedi- 
ately going forth again into the world with an in- 
crease of hardness in their hearts! This was an in- 
quiry meeting that Nicodemus attended that night, 
a kind of meeting that I should like to have after 
every evangelistic service. I suppose that there 
were many things that sought to hold him back. He 
was a prominent man in religious circles; and this 
young Teacher, who had but recently graduated into 
the ministry from a carpenter's bench, having no 
academic degree, was regarded with suspicion, not 
being popular in the society in which Nicodemus 
moved. I suppose Satan plied the mind of Nico- 
demus that night with many an objection. Perhaps 
the man halted several times on the way to that room 
where Christ was, in the darkness of the night de- 
bating the propriety of his course. There were grave 
issues at stake on both sides of the case. He battled 
with himself, Satan furnishing him with weapons 
for the conflict, those weapons from the black 
armory of hell. But he walks on, coming 



THE LIFTED CHRIST 271 

in view of an upper chamber of a certain 
house in the town, the light of a flickering lamp shin- 
ing through the lattice work of the window, every 
now and then the wind blowing upon the flame of 
that lamp, as if to extinguish it, and that same fitful 
breeze afterwards giving the Christ an illustration of 
the mysterious movements of the Holy Spirit. Now 
he has reached the house. His foot is on the stair- 
way outside. Shall he ascend that stairway? What 
if some of his friends should see him calling at that 
house? Everybody in the town knows who is lodg- 
ing there. It is Satan's last desperate chance. If 
Nicodemus yields, another soul has eluded the grasp 
of his grimy hand. But Nicodemus will not falter 
now. His feet are upon the creaking steps. Every 
argument for his detention is burst from him, as 
though they are naught but spider-webs. His hand 
knocks boldly at the door. A gentle voice from 
within bids him enter. He is face to face with his 
God and Saviour. 

I do not care what you call it, whether God's sov- 
ereignty or man's free agency. My belief is that it 
was both. But that is an entirely different matter from 
saying that it was fate. There is no such thing as 
fate. That is one of the exploded superstitions of 
heathen mythology. But something was drawing 
Nicodemus to that upper room; something was also 
trying hard to turn him away; but in the full exer- 
cise of his own unhindered will he went to Christ. 
And that is the history of every real conversion that 



2?2 THE LIFTED CHRIST 

ever was or that ever will be. It is God and man 
coming together, and because they both want each 
other. If God were the only factor in the case, He, 
of course, could bring men to Him ; but it would be 
by reason of superior force. That would fill His 
kingdom with unwilling subjects. If man were the 
only factor in the case, how many souls would ever 
go in quest of God? Silence is the answer. Not 
one! Not one! But while the Shepherd is seeking 
for His lost sheep, the lost sheep are seeking the 
Shepherd ; and blessed be God ! they find each other. 
I do not see why there should be any reluctance to 
give God all the glory in the salvation of souls. For 
man there is no glory. What would have become 
of our world if in it had never been heard the foot- 
falls of a gracious God bent on saving men? To 
ask the question is to answer it. The population of 
hell would have overflowed like a swollen river. 

I say again, if men and women would only consent 
to talk upon this important subject, instead of fight- 
ing against the truth, resisting the gentle persuasive- 
ness of the Holy Spirit, the bells in the crystal tow- 
ers of the celestial city would never cease pealing 
their joy over the return of the prodigals of earth. 
I am glad that Nicodemus went up those stairs that 
night and engaged Jesus in conversation. I am also 
glad that he went of his own accord. Christ was 
waiting for him. In like manner, my friend, is He 
graciously waiting for you. When will you go to 
Him? 



THE LIFTED CHRIST 273 

Now we are ready for the unfolding of the text. 
Christ here calls the attention of Nicodemus to a 
piece of Jewish history with which Nicodemus was 
perfectly familiar. No occasion to go after a far- 
fetched illustration. Although Nicodemus was an 
educated man, Christ did not deem it necessary to 
tickle the vanity of His hearer. We ministers some- 
times sail away in balloons, when we ought to keep 
close to the ground. Christ was not fishing for com- 
pliments that night. His line had been cast into 
water too deep for that. He was after a soul. He 
meets that soul on the level. "Moses lifted up the 
serpent in the wilderness." Yes; Nicodemus knew 
that. He also knew why that serpent was lifted. 
It was for the purpose of staying the terrible poison 
of the fiery serpents that had gone twisting them- 
selves through the camp of God's ancient people on 
the way to Canaan, those fiery serpents sent among 
them as a judgment from God for their sins. Re- 
penting of their sins, God commanded Moses to cast 
a brazen image of a serpent, and set that image on 
a pole within sight of every tent. Those who looked 
to that brazen serpent were immediately healed. It 
was their faith that healed them. 

Nicodemus understood all that. But Christ here 
gives that event an application that had been over- 
looked by Nicodemus and other doctors of divinity 
then living. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the 
wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted 
up." Why? "That whosoever believeth in him 
18 



274 THE LIFTED CHRIST 

should not perish, but have eternal life." If the 
Jews of those days had more closely examined the 
symbolism of their Scriptures, they would not have 
been expecting a Christ who was to be no more than 
a mere descendant of David. Nor would they have 
been guilty of rejecting the Christ who came to them. 
They were dreaming of a splendid Hebrew mon- 
archy, not looking for a spiritual empire. They were 
dreaming of a throne, not looking for a cross. They 
were dreaming of a king, not looking for a sacrificial 
lamb. 

What Christ said to Nicodemus that night He said 
to the world for all coming time. Triers was no re- 
porter present at that interview. The account of 
that wonderful conversation was afterwards given to 
the Apostle John, and by him embalmed as an in- 
spired record for multitudinous eyes to read and mul- 
titudinous hearts to feel. Those words from the 
lips of the Saviour Himself, "As Moses lifted up the 
serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of 
man be lifted up," were meant to teach the world 
the necessity of an atonement of blood for the re- 
moval of sin. That was what brought Christ to our 
insignificant earth. For that, the disrobing of heav- 
enly garments and the putting on of the lowly dress 
of humanity. For that the manger of Bethlehem in 
exchange for the palace of the skies. For that the 
forsaking of angelic praises for the curses of human 
foes. For that the wealth of the universe surren- 
dered for the poverty of thirty-three years of life in 



THE LIFTED CHRIST 275 

the flesh. For that the sceptre of omnipotence laid 
down for the saw and plane and hammer of the Naz- 
areth carpenter shop. Over His Bethlehem birth- 
place seraphs flashed their wings and seraph choirs 
poured their songs; but amid all the brightness of 
that hour there was the shadow of the Cross; and 
amid all the melody of that hour were the groans 
of the crucifixion. A Cross beside His immovable 
cradle in the stable of the inn. A Cross beside His 
work bench. A Cross on the fishing boat of Galilee* 
A Cross upon the Mount of Transfiguration. A 
Cross wherever He journeyed and wherever He tar- 
ried. A Cross ! A Cross ! That Cross was an eter- 
nal Cross. It first came to view before human eyes 
near the gates of ruined Eden. It afterwards showed 
itself in the dripping blood of sacrificial altars, and 
was outlined against the sky in the smoke of those 
sacrifices, that smoke curling upward to kiss the 
clouds of heaven. It revealed itself in the wilder- 
ness in the image of the brazen serpent uplifted by 
the hand of Moses. Christ came to die, not as other 
men die, but as the Lamb of God. That was the 
mission with which He was charged. That was the 
mission which He fulfilled. His last words, before 
the spirit left His bruised and mangled body, were, 
''It is finished !" As He thus spoke, His heart burst, 
and a place was made within for every sinner of that 
present age, and for every sinner of all the ages to 
come, even if this old world should continue traveling 
through the heavens sixty billion years. 



276 THE LIFTED CHRIST 

"Must the Son of man be lifted up." In that sen- 
tence from the lips of Christ that little word "must" 
weighs more than the whole world. "Must!" That 
means that the death of Christ was no mere make- 
shift, speaking reverently, but an absolutely necessary 
necessity. There was no other way to remove your 
sins and mine, or those of anybody else. Had there 
been, the infinite brain of the Almighty could have 
conceived it and put it into operation. There was no 
other way. Ye angels of light, solve the problem! 
Tell, if ye can, how guilty men can be allowed to go 
free without violence to the eternal principles of Jus- 
tice and without shaming the face of Mercy! I see 
them bending to the task. I see them conferring 
together in council. They bring to bear upon the 
question all the accumulated gifts of their superior 
intelligence. They cannot give the answer. They 
are speechless. It is a query that only God Himself 
can undo. Even He can find no other than that of 
the Cross. No other way ! "Even so must the Son 
of man be lifted up!" 

Yet there have been those, and still are, who have 
made light of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. But in 
the very face of all criticism stands that little but 
tremendously emphatic word "Must!" \gainst that 
wall let infidelity batter out its brains, if it will, and 
lose its soul. But on ladders of repentance and faith 
many have climbed to the top of that wall, and looked 
off upon the glories of heaven. O my friend, mount 
those same ladders to-day, and see for yourself the 



THE LIFTED CHRIST 277 

beauty and richness and grandeur of the Gospel of 
Christ. God's "must" makes for you the privilege of 
everlasting salvation. Along with that "must" link 
your will. 

Go back to that scene in the wilderness. Many 
had been bitten by the fiery serpents. They were 
writhing in the agony of the poison that had inflamed 
their veins. Yonder is reared the serpent of brass. 
The command goes through the plague-smitten 
camp, "Look, and live!" Those who obey are in- 
stantly healed. It mattered not how far the virulence 
had gone into their system, one look at that image 
of brass, even though it were the look of a djing 
man, stayed the poison and brought health. It was 
confidence or faith in God's promise that broke the 
malady. 

How apt a picture is that of the sin that has fas- 
tened itself upon the heart of mankind ! A serpent's 
fangs have been driven into the very life of the race. 
Wherever you go, you find the people dying be- 
cause of sin. They have been mortally wounded. 
There is no place where the sting of sin has not been 
felt. No spot anywhere on the round earth without 
the presence of this fearful and soul destroying 
plague. "All have sinned, and come short of the 
glory of God." But there is a remedy — an all- 
powerful remedy. It never fails. It never has failed. 
Blessed be God ! it never will fail. 

Here, again, is another apt picture. For the ser- 
pent-bitten Israelites the look at the uplifted ser- 



278 THE LIFTED CHRIST 

pent of brass, that serpent of brass flashing out in the 
sunlight before every eye; for the serpent-bitten 
sinner the look at the Cross of Jesus Christ, that 
Cross blazing its beneficence in the sheen of nine- 
teen centuries. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in 
the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted 
up," Himself crucified by human sin and for human 
sin, the hatred of men driving Him to Calvary, but 
the grace of God making Calvary the scene of an 
atonement sufficient for all who will accept it. "Even 
so must the Son of man be lifted up ; that whosoever 
believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal 
life." This the Gospel that Christ preached to Nico-. 
demus. This the Gospel that the Apostles preached 
as they went forth into the world. This the Gospel 
that has come down all the ages, and which, as an 
ambassador of Christ, I am privileged to preach in 
this pulpit of Buckingham Church to you. Glorious 
Gospel! Majestic Gospel! Precious Gospel! "Life 
for a look at the crucified One !" Life for you ! Life 
for whosoever will believe! An angel's tongue can- 
not proclaim it. God has placed its matchless elo- 
quence upon the stammering lips of^hose who were 
once lost sinners but are now sinners saved by His 
grace. I speak to you as one who well knows what 
it means to be a rebel against God. I also speak to 
you as one who well knows what it means to be 
reconciled to God. This is no coldly intellectual 
treatment of this theme. It is the warm experience 
of a regenerated heart. Upon that Cros; to which I 



THE LIFTED CHRIST 279 

urge you to look I have fastened all my hopes of 
heaven. That Cross is the very core of all my the- 
ology. 

But all through this sermon of mine I have been 
asking myself a question. What is the secret of 
this uplifted Cross? One word tells it all. Listen! 
Love ! In this same discourse to Nicodemus there is 
another emphatic word. The Son of man must be 
lifted up. "For God so loved the world, that he 
gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth 
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." 
That word "so" is charged with the infinite love of an 
infinite Heart. Behold it yonder, the Cross of Cal- 
vary! Human hate is there revealed in the cruel 
thorns and the sharp-pointed nails; tut through the 
shadows of that hate shines the glory of divine love 
"God so loved the world." "Must be lifted up." 
There was no way for man to be saved; but Love 
made a way Yet there are hearts so hard they will 
not be melted by the breath of that love. Is that your 
heart, my friend? The Holy Spirit awaits your an- 
swer. Let it be a negative that shall have in it the 
tone of a crashing thunderbolt. 



Strength for the Day 

As thy days, so shall thy strength be. Deut. 33 : 25. 

This is a tonic text. A good dose of it will put 
iron into spiritual blood that is thin. The Bible is 
full of such tonic texts. Instead of trying the quack 
remedies of the world, it would be better if God's 
despondent children should always get their medi- 
cine from this divine pharmacy. For a fit of mind 
depression there is nothing so powerful as the prom- 
ises of the Bible. 

One day Philip Melancthon and Martin Luther 
were sitting together in utter discouragement. They 
had been talking about the darkness that was over- 
shadowing the Church. As they talked, that dark- 
ness seemed to be many midnights rolled into one 
solid mass of gloom. The more they talked, the 
heavier their hearts became. But suddenly Luther 
rose up and said, "Come, Philip, let us sing the Forty- 
sixth Psalm." They sang it — "God is our refuge 
and strength, a very present help in trouble. There- 
fore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, 
and though the mountains be carried into the midst 
of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be 
troubled, though the mountains shake with the swell- 
ing thereof. Selah." Having finished the song, the 
darkness lifted from their souls. The gates of the 



STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 281 

dawn had opened. Through those gates came the 
sunrise of hope and faith. There are no shadows 
that can hang before the light of God's Word. "As 
thy days, so shall thy strength be." 

I. I would apply these words to all forms of anx- 
iety. It was against anxiety that a part of Christ's 
wonderful Sermon on the Mount was preached. It 
is useless ever to be in an anxious state of mind. 
But it is such a mental condition that often troubles 
the most of people. That was true in all the past 
centuries. Who will say that it is not true now? 
It will also be true in the ages to come. The human 
brain naturally has that sort of a twist in it. 

The most prevalent form of anxiety is that of bor- 
rowing trouble. Of all borrowing this is the very 
worst. The old Shylock who gives the loan demands 
an exorbitant rate of interest. We pay back to that 
wily usurer, not only a pound or more of flesh, but 
bitterness of soul, and despair, and shadows through 
which glide ugly spectres, under the burden of the 
loan, the face becoming pinched and wrinkled, and 
the heart beating itself into premature death. At 
every step we hear the hoarse voice of the usurer 
crying, "111 have my bond! I'll have my bond!" 
Many a man, followed thus by this Shylock of anx- 
iety, has sought to escape him through the clicking 
of a pistol, or through the stretching of a rope, or 
through the mixing of a poison, or through a plunge 
into the waters. 

Shakespeare wrote many a tragedy. But it would 



282 STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 

take a greater than a Shakespeare to write the trag- 
edies that lie within the human mind. Shakespeare 
said that all the world is a stage; and that men and 
women are the actors upon that stage, having their 
entrances and their exits. But every mortal brain 
is a stage; and the actors thereon are thoughts — 
often those actors wrapped in sombre robes, and 
moving among weird scenery, like the ghostly forms 
that step along the corridors of a theatre of night- 
mare. To borrow trouble is to doubt the goodness 
of God. 

I have often thought of the pleasures of the im- 
agination. In the midst of winter, when there is 
a tempest abroad, and when there is snow on the 
ground, and when all the streams have been closed 
by the sheriff of the year, upon their crystal doors 
a seal of ice, I can sit beside a blazing fire and call 
up thoughts of summer. I can then see green fields 
all dotted with daisies and buttercups, and behold 
running brooks that flash their kisses to the sky, and 
look upon bright-robed orchard trees adorned like 
a bride for her husband, and hear the singing of the 
birds, as they praise God from the gallery of the 
woods, their notes accompanied by the tones that 
pour forth from the organ of the wind. I can pro- 
duce summer in my mind. 

Yet this same power that affords pleasure can be 
turned into an instrument of torture worse than any 
that was used in the Spanish Inquisition. Under the 
spell of opium, the imperial imagination of Thomas 



STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 283 

De Quincey degenerated into a chamber of horrors. 
But one can terrify himself without the use of drugs. 
If you would whip your soul with a knotted lash, or 
if you would stretch your soul upon a bed of knives, 
or if you would pinch your soul with heated tongs, 
just give way to a mental experience of trouble that 
has no reality. 

Yonder sits a mother before the cradle of her 
child. Giving rein to her fancy, that mother is car- 
ried into future days. She beholds that rosy form, 
now asleep in the cradle, shrouded in the pallor of 
death, like a lingering flower of the summer covered 
with the frost of autumn. She beholds the gathered 
darkness that follows her loss, that darkness hang- 
ing in heavy folds all around her home, and hanging 
in still heavier folds around her heart. The little one 
is prepared for burial. It is laid in another cradle 
— the motionless cradle of the grave. The whole 
scene moves before her vision with all its details 
vividly painted. But it is all imaginary. That mother 
is simply hurting herself with what is not true. Bor- 
rowing trouble! 

But let us suppose that death does come to that 
child. The mother is almost crazed by grief. But 
there follows consolation. He who long ago said, 
"Suffer the little children to come unto me," stands 
beside her in her real trouble, and comforts her with 
His grace. Into the surrounding gloom falls the 
music of a voice that says, "As thy days so shall thy 
strength be." Under the touch of divine fingers, and 



284 STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 

beneath the gentleness of divine words, that mother 
is sustained. "Underneath are the everlasting arms." 

So with all fancied sorrows. Men have thought 
that financial straits, or their removal from good po- 
sitions, or a hundred other things, for I need not 
stop to name the whole list, would strike them like 
a heavy wagon drawn by a pair of runaway horses, 
and knock them down, and roll out their very life. 
But when the fancied tribulation assumed reality, 
they found grace in their time of need. The cloud 
that their imagination piled up on the horizon, black 
as the ninth plague of Egypt, came on, and, behold, 
right beneath its pelting drops, as it spread over the 
sky, the grass smiled into a richer green, and a thou- 
sand flowers burst forth into fulness of bloom! In 
plain words, God gives His children gains in their 
losses. Every cloud has an edging of gold. Adver- 
sities that come, like the toad of the poet's verse, 
ugly and venomous, wear a precious jewel in their 
heads. But often, alas ! we fail to see any brightness 
in the cloud, and fail to see the flashing gem in the 
head of the adversity. 

It is here that my text applies. It says to you and 
me, and every child of God, "Do not borrow trouble. 
If there is trouble on the way, wait for it and take its 
blow." If we have faith enough, that waiting will 
be like the waiting of a rock-bound coast for the in- 
rolling waves of the ocean, breaking those waves 
into splinters of diamond spray. "As thy days, so 
shall thy strength be." 



STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 285 

What is the use in having the spirit of foreboding ? 
What is foreboding? It is an unbroken horse with a 
timid driver. Faith jumps into the same vehicle, 
takes the same lines, and the fractious beast moves 
on as if it had been accustomed to the harness for 
twenty years. That is just the difference between 
feverish anxiety and trusting in the promises of God. 
Our Father tells us over and over again in His letter 
from heaven to us that He will fit us for every con- 
dition of life. "As thy days, so shall thy strength 
be." 

II. I would apply these words to all forms of 
discouragement. It often happens that good persons 
are dispirited in their Christian work. After what 
seemed to be a total failure, Elijah ran away and 
threw himself down beneath a juniper tree, sobbing 
there like a disappointed child, and praying for 
death. Strong natures frequently have such times of 
mental depression. Elijah's juniper tree still bears 
leaves. It has sheltered many a discouraged ser- 
vant of the Lord. 

But here is balm for every such wounded soul. 
Let the very worst come that can come. God pro- 
vides for every disaster that breaks the heart. "As 
thy days, so shall thy strength be." There is no use 
in being crushed by disappointment. When Sam- 
son was shut up within the town of Gaza, his enemies 
thought they had him safe. But with God-given 
strength, Samson rose up in the night, wrenched the 
bars of the gates asunder, those gates within the 



286 STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 

walls of the city, and carried the gates away upon his 
broad shoulders. So may you and I do likewise with 
those things that would confine us within the Philis- 
tine town of Discouragement. "As thy days, so 
shall thy strength be." 

If there ever was one who had great cause for 
discouragement, that one was Christ. How few His 
converts, speaking comparatively ! How much scorn 
He endured! What dishonors were heaped upon 
Him ! But you never find Christ giving way to hope- 
lessness. Christ was the great Optimist of all the 
centuries. He believed in God. In that case He be- 
lieved in Himself, for He was Himself the Lord. 
Even at the very last, in full view of the Cross, He 
said to His disciples, "Be of good cheer; I have 
overcome the world." Through the gathering storm 
of Calvary He beheld the sunburst of victory. 

When I was a boy, and was sent out to water the 
garden, that garden filled with my mother's favorite 
flowers, I was accustomed to give myself pleas- 
ure by making rainbows. How did I make them? 
Why, I just turned the nozzle of the hose into the 
sunshine, and the rainbow would appear. I helped to 
do there on a small scale what the sun often does 
on a large scale, when behind the retreating shower 
he springs the iris bow of triumph. My youthful 
sport gave me a bit of philosophy for future use. 
We can make our own rainbows. How? By turn- 
ing our disappointments into the light of God's prom- 
ises. Look at the gorgeous colors that come into 



STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 287 

view beneath the brilliance of the text! "As thy 
days, so shall thy strength be." That is one of the 
best rainbow-makers of the whole Bible. 

III. I would apply these words to all forms of 
difficulty. There is no difficulty that this text can- 
not throw. Do you wish illustrations? Look at 
Abraham! He had been led to hope for an heir. 
In the course of time, after long but not very patient 
waiting, for the saints of the Bible were by no means 
perfect men and women, the heir came. But when 
the old father's heart was completely wrapped around 
his son Isaac, like a sudden crash of a thunderbolt, 
came the divine command, "Take thy beloved son 
and sacrifice him." Yonder I see the old man mak- 
ing preparation to carry out that order from heaven. 
His heart hangs within him like a ball of iron. Yet 
he believed in God. His faith in God would not al- 
low him to sit down before this difficulty utterly 
nerveless. He went on with his preparation, feeling 
that in some way the Lord would open a path of de- 
liverance. God would not rob him. But Abraham 
was tested up to the very last moment. It was not 
until the knife flashed in the sun up there on Mt. 
Moriah, and the father's arm was about to sweep 
down and drive death into the vitals of Isaac, that 
the divine order was countermanded. That was a 
hard road for Abraham to travel ; but God furnished 
His obedient servant with shoes of iron and brass. 
See those shoes striking fire as they hit the stones 
up the mountain-side ! It was in fulfillment of the 
promise, "As thy days, so shall thy strength be." 



288 STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 

Look at Moses! What? Leave the solitudes of 
the wilderness, where he was happy, and confront 
Pharaoh on his throne? It was an appalling com- 
mission. But the Lord equipped his servant with the 
necessary strength for that task, Moses went. Out 
of that going came a commonwealth. 

Look at David ! There came an inspiration to him 
in his youth to go forth and down the boastful Goliath 
who had been defying the army of Israel. Saul 
wanted to put his armor on the boy. David tried that 
armor. It was a misfit, too large and too heavy. 
Besides that; what did he want of armor? No; he 
would meet the giant in plain shepherd dress. But 
beneath that shepherd robe was the armor of God. 
The whirl of the sling in the deft hand of that strip- 
ling, the loosing of a smooth stone picked up from a 
brook, the swift rush of the missile through the air, 
an angelic hand guiding it, and yonder Goliath lies 
stretched upon the ground, a fallen mountain of 
flesh, a carcass of braggadocio. "As thy days, so shall 
thy strength be." 

Look at Paul ! His adoption of the religion of 
Jesus Christ brought him into many difficulties. But 
was he afraid? With God's strength upon him, a 
spiritual Samson, he rocked prisons with earth- 
quakes. With the same God-given strength, he 
shook gubernatorial chairs and the thrones of kings 
and emperors. 

Look at Martin Luther! God said to that man, 
"Purge My Church !" The barefoot monk of Wit- 



STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 289 

tenberg put on shoes of iron and brass and awoke 
a sleeping Reformation. What was one man against 
a corrupt Church that both crowned and uncrowned 
the monarchs of the world? But Luther walked on, 
his strength equal to his days, and obeyed God's 
command. The blows that he struck for the cause 
of righteousness are yet echoing in the air of earth. 

Look at John Knox! He feared the face of no 
man. Even royalty could not frighten him. A man 
of iron! 

Look at the two Wesleys, one battering the bul- 
warks of evil with song, the other battering them 
with prayers and sermons! 

Look at Whitefield ! His preaching tours bringing 
him into numerous difficulties ; often expounding the 
Word of God amid a ruffianly shower of rotten eggs 
and decayed vegetables; yet conquering by his com- 
manding eloquence. 

But why go so far back for illustrations? Your 
own life will furnish them. You have proved again 
and again the truth of the text, "As thy days, so 
shall thy strength be." Let those words come home 
to you at this hour with renewed force. I would 
write them upon the door of every Christian house- 
hold, upon the door of every Christian bank and 
store and shop and factory, upon the door of every 
Christian school, upon the door of every church audi- 
torium and Sabbath-school room. Behold them, as 
I trace them there to-day in letters of sunshine ! How 
they glisten ! "As thy days, so shall thy strength be." 
19 



290 STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 

IV. I would apply these words to all forms of sen- 
sitiveness about critical opinions. It is from some 
form of sensitiveness that much of the trouble of life 
comes. We are all too apt to be mindful of what is 
said of us. The fear of criticism makes its own 
trouble. A young man, for example, fails in one of 
his collegiate examinations. That is nothing at all 
serious, for some of the world's greatest men have 
done likewise. At school Adam Clark was a dull 
youth ; so was Walter Scott, who was pronounced to 
be a perfect dunce. But the failure of the present 
may become a stepping-stone into future success. 
That was just what happened in the case of the two 
boys whom I have mentioned. Adam Clark and 
Walter Scott both rose into fame, one becoming a 
learned commentator of the Scriptures, the other de- 
veloping into a brilliant wizard of speech, his novels 
taking their place among the classics of the English 
language. 

But the young man who fails is apt to ask him- 
self, "What will my acquaintances say about this? 
Will they not think that I am of no worth, and that 
I shall never amount 'to anything?" 

Another young man sets his heart upon a certain 
position. He does not get it. That, however, is of 
small moment. Wherever there is a good comfort- 
able niche to be filled, there will be hundreds of ap- 
plicants. They cannot all gain the prize. But the 
young man is greatly disappointed. Yet keen as 
is his disappointment, it is made sharper by the prob- 



STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 291 

able comments of those who know him. It may be 
that the cry will be, "Incompetent! Let him stay 
where he belongs. It is not well for such as he to 
have an ambition that is too broad of wing." 

I tell you that there is many a man who could walk 
boldly right up to the mouth of a loaded cannon, the 
fuse burning, who has not the moral couiage to face 
the opinions of his fellows under circumstances such 
as these. The people will talk; and talk adversely. 
Men and women often come together in groups, like 
students in a medical hall, and dissect other persons' 
misfortunes. They come together, like a coroner's 
jury, to investigate dead hopes. They come together 
like a flock of buzzards, those buzzards flapping their 
wings, and plunging their filthy beaks and talons into 
a putrid carcass. Many persons dread criticism far 
more than they dread the thing itself that sets the 
cancerous tongue of gossip in motion. 

But the promise of the text takes in all such cases. 
God comes as a loving Father to all such, and sooth- 
ingly says, "Mind not what men and women think 
and speak. Rise up, and be a man. Go forward. 
'As thy days, so shall thy strength be.' " 

"If God be for us, who can be against us?" 
Blessed the man who believes that! It will always 
be an inspiration to him, sweetening many a bitter 
cup, covering many a cross with flowers, throwing 
a scarf of rainbow over the black shoulders of many 
a storm. Give me the consciousness that God is 
with me, and I will go out and lose a battle of Water- 



292 STRENGTH FOR THE DAY 

loo, and then snap my fingers at a sneering world, as 
I would snap them at a terrier dog barking at my 
heels ! 

Was I not right in calling this a tonic text? Let 
us take its cheering ingredients. It will nerve us for 
climbing the hills of the Christian life. By and by 
we shall stand upon the shining summits of those 
hills. We shall need no tonic then. The very air 
that we draw into our lungs will be itself invigorat- 
ing, for then we shall be far beyond the toils and 
struggles and pain and heartaches of earth. Up 
there is heaven. 

"Then let our songs abound, 

And every tear be dry; 
We're marching thro' Immanuel's ground, 
To fairer worlds on high." 



The Angel Upon the Stone 

The angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came 
ind rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it. 
Matthew 28:2. 

I once stood before the sepulchre of George 
Washington at Mt. Vernon. The dust of that fa- 
mous man was yet there. That dust was guarded 
and held imprisoned by Death, the one who unseats 
all presidents and dethrones all kings and emperors 
and czars, himself the very mightiest of monarchs. 
He was crowned by sin six thousand years ago or 
more ; and the same pair of black hands that crowned 
him then have kept him crowned ever since. I give 
you inspired proof of my statement. Says Paul, "By 
one man sin entered into the world, and death by 



sin. 



But there was one illustrious Personage whose 
tomb Death could not keep closed. Upon that tomb 
he had placed the seal of the greatest government on 
earth; and around it were stationed Roman soldiers. 
Within that tomb the body of Christ had been lying 
for two whole nights. So far Death was triumphant. 
He who had raised the dead was Himself dead. 
Christ lifeless; flat upon his back; locked securely 
within a wall of rocks. Rocks above Him ; rocks be- 
neath Him; rocks behind Him; rocks in front of 
Him ; the doorway of that sepulcher-prison darkened 



294 THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 

and barricaded by a sculptured rock. But on the 
morning of the third day, by a key of earthquake, 
that huge door of stone was unfastened, the rattling 
of that key in the wards of the lock sending a convul- 
sive jar among those piled up walls of death, and 
shaking the very foundations of the world. The 
same hand that held that key, a hand angelic, also 
rolled back the ponderous stone door of the dungeon 
and made it a stool, sitting on it. Having unwrapped 
Himself of His grave clothes, and folded the napkin 
that bound His head, Christ then leisurely came 
forth into liberty, His first sight that of a garden all 
abloom with flowers. 

This is the wondrous fact that we celebrate to-day. 
The lilies, and hyacinths, and crocuses, and gerani- 
ums, and jonquils of this Sabbath morning in spring 
are the lineal descendants of the blossoms that 
greeted the risen Christ and threw Him kisses, as He 
stepped forth into the silvery dawn of the Resurrec- 
tion. The flowers are still greeting Him, and still 
throwing Him their perfumed kisses. Let no human 
soul be outdone by the flowers. All hail, Thou living 
Christ! From the garden of our hearts we gather 
the flowers of love and loyalty, and twist them into 
a garland for Thy thorn-scarred brow. 

I. I ask you to notice that the women who went 
to the sepulchre of the Christ, not knowing that it 
had been opened by an angel from heaven, brought 
aromatics in token of their love for the Master. 
Those were dried flowers, the beauty of their bloom- 



THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 295 

ing gone, but still fragrant. I seem to detect the 
spirit of those spice-laden shrubs to-day in the odors 
of the plants that adorn this Easter Sabbath. Right 
glad I am that those devoted women went to that 
tomb with their hands full of aromatics. Some of the 
cowardly male disciples of Christ came stealthily to 
the sepulchre after the women had gone away; but 
their hands were empty. With the women love had 
conquered all fear. They went to embalm the body 
of their Lord. To woman is given an answering 
sweetness in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. More 
women Christians than men. More women in our 
churches to-day than men. More women than men 
loyally gathered at the feet of the living Saviour. 
Woman being the first visitor at the grave of Christ, 
and carrying there the spices of an affectionate min- 
istry, she has been blessed with pre-eminence in every 
department of Christian grace and movement. Her 
love for Christ has grandly flowered through nearly 
nineteen centuries of time. Accursed be the hands 
that would pull her down from her Christian exalta- 
tion into the dust of bondage ! Away with heathen- 
ish Mormonism from Christian America ! That foul 
thing would drive woman back into the open tomb 
of Christianity, and roll again the stone against the 
door, and bury all her godly refinement and right- 
eousness of character in a charnal-house forever. 
What we need to-day is an earthquake of moral in- 
dignation to rumble over all of this fair land, an 
earthquake that will pale the brow of political pre- 



296 THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 

ferment. Then let an angel from heaven lift the 
rock from that sepulchre of feminine degradation 
masked as a religion, and sit down on that rock, as 
he takes his seat, the force of the vibration shaking 
our national Capitol from foundation walls to dome, 
and clear up to the cap upon the head of the Goddess 
of Liberty ! The Lord speed the hour ! 

Yes; Christianity is aromatic. It sweetens human 
life. Let us imitate these old-time women, putting 
more of the spicery of the Gospel into our preaching 
and teaching, and sending its fragrance everywhere 
for the deodorization of the world's noxiousness of 
sin. Aromatics! That was what the Magi brought 
the infant Christ. He started upon His mission with 
perfume. But He did not need it. He was Him- 
self the Rose of Sharon. Aromatics! That was 
what the Marys brought for the embalment of His 
body. But, again, He was not in need of those dried 
shrubs. The open grave, with an angel sitting upon 
its rock-door, proclaimed His resurrection into im- 
mortal bloom. Yet we can take the hint wrapped up 
in those aromatic offerings, and go forth to purify 
the world with Christian faith and practice and in- 
struction. 

II. I ask you to notice the angelic agent at the res- 
urrection of the Christ. "The angel of the Lord de- 
scended from heaven, and came and rolled back the 
stone from the door, and sat upon it." Which one 
of heaven's distinguished inhabitants it was we do 
not know, however much we should like to know. 



THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 297 

The Bible was not written to satisfy human curiosity. 
It does not deal with trivial things. But I am glad 
to read that it was an angel who performed this 
great feat. That relieves my mind of the least doubt 
in regard to the fact of Christ's resurrection. Had 
it been merely an earthquake that tumbled that rock- 
door from its fastenings, it might have been that the 
Roman soldiers would have been frightened away by 
the phenomenon, the disciples afterwards removing 
the body and pretending that there had been a res- 
urrection. It was a story somewhat like this that 
those Roman soldiers were hired by the chief priests 
to circulate, only that they were to state that the 
body was stolen while they slept, a most improbable 
tale, for it was a punishable offense for a Roman sol- 
dier to sleep at his post, even as such neglect of duty 
is with us a punishable offense. 

"But," objects some one, "the narrative distinctly 
says that there was an earthquake." So it does. I 
had not overlooked that fact. But it says, too, that 
the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and 
came and rolled back the stone from the door, and 
sat upon it. The earthquake was caused by the de- 
scent of the angel. He came so swiftly down and 
alighted so suddenly upon the world that the impact 
of his feet shook the very ground beneath him to its 
far-away depths. Here was a seraphic personality. 
An earthquake might have jarred the door from the 
mouth of the tomb, but an earthquake could not have 
sat upon that door. Besides that, speaking of the 



298 THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 

angel, the narrative says that his countenance was 
like lightning, and his raiment white as snow; and 
that for fear of him the keepers of the sepulchre 
trembled, and became as dead men. Tfyey swooned 
away in fright. The wonder is that they were not 
struck dead. That same angel was afterwards seen 
by the women who were earliest at the grave, having 
left his chair of rock and gone inside the tomb. 
Luke tells us that he was joined by another celestial. 
I can readily imagine that the garden of Joseph of 
Arimathea was alive with angels that morning, but 
not making themselves visible — angels with folded 
wings walking the paths; angels sitting around the 
shattered sepulchre; angels standing within the 
empty tomb ; angels flying through the air ; the whole 
place rainbowed with angels. It would not have 
staggered my faith had the narrative so stated. 

But the presence of the angel of the Lord at the 
resurrection of the Christ confirms the belief of the 
Christian world in this distinctive doctrine of the 
Christian religion. No angel would have come 
down from heaven simply to roll away the stone from 
a tomb containing a dead body. God never sends His 
angels forth on senseless missions. This angel came 
to let the living Christ out. Christ, being Himself 
the Lord of Glory, might have spoken but a word, 
as when He breathed worlds into existence, and His 
grave-prison would have fallen about Him with a 
crash. But He preferred to have a servant do the 
work for Him, letting that servant remain behind for 



THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 299 

a season in testimony of His rising from the dead. 
To the women who sought the body of their Lord 
this angel became a witness, telling them that Jesus 
was alive, and inviting them into the sepulchre to see 
the place where He had slept the sleep of death, tak- 
ing a short nap after His fatigue of cross-bearing. 
When I find the track of angel feet around the grave 
of Christ, I cannot help believing in the fact of the 
resurrection. Into this narrative the Holy Spirit 
has woven celestial light and celestial pinions and 
celestial utterance* It is not difficult to give cre- 
dence to a story that angels have written and punc- 
tuated. I dwell on these things because others have 
not particularly noticed them. 

More than that; this angel rolling away the stone 
from the tomb of the Christ is another proof of 
heavenly interest in the redemption of mankind. 
How the gospel blossoms with angels! An angel 
announcing to the Virgin Mary the miraculous and 
immaculate conception of Christ. A choir of angels 
when Christ was born, and chanting His natal song 
from the starlit gallery of cloud over Bethlehem's 
hills. An angel strengthening the agonized Christ 
in Gethsemane, helping to sweeten the bitter cup that 
was about to be pressed to His lips. Unseen angels 
closing the shutters of the sky and darkening the 
death-chamber of open air at the crucifixion of 
Christ on Calvary. An angel rolling the rock-door 
from the sepulchre of the risen Christ, and then a 
pair of angels sitting where He had lain, one at the 



300 THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 

head, the other at the feet. Angels after He had 
gone up into heaven, those angels suddenly standing 
beside the upward-gazing disciples and prophesying 
His second advent. Angels ! Angels ! Angels ! The 
world celestial in sympathy with the world terrestial. 
Not spirits coming to earth on frivolous errands, 
coming to rap on tables and ring bells and open 
doors, but on their silent wings flying this way and 
flying that way on ministries of love. That invisible 
world a real world. A definite, localized sphere in 
God's universe. The home of our departed kindred 
and friends. What was it that Christ said about the 
angels ? Oh, yes ! I remember. It was that the an- 
gels rejoice over the return of the prodigals of earth 
to their Father's house and heart. Would that they 
might be thrilled with that gladness this Easter Sab- 
bath morning ! Oh, my friend, what think you of the 
resurrected Christ,? Answer that question in this 
jubilant hour, joining your voice with us in ascribing 
to Him all honor and praise and glory and blessing. 
Then the waiting angels gathered to this resurrec- 
tion anniversary would speed back to the throne of 
Christ with the news that they like best to bear to the 
skies. 

III. I ask you to notice that this angel of the res- 
urrection sat upon the stone that he had rolled away 
from Christ's tomb. You have often heard sermons 
about the angel's pushing back of that rock-door, 
but probably you have never heard it remarked that 
the angel sat upon that rock-door after he had lifted 



THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 301 

it from its place. Why is that sublime fact slighted? 
It is suggestive to me of most weighty thoughts. 

Well, was the angel tired after that prodigious ef- 
fort of opening the Saviour's tomb ? If that be your 
supposition, you do not know much about angels. 
They never get tired. You and I will some day excel 
them in strength, putting on then our immortal 
bodies. That is to be one of the many benefits to us 
of Christ's resurrection. But that angel could have 
shouldered that stupendous rock more easily than 
you or I could pick up a vase of flowers, carrying 
his load unbesweated to the very gates of hell. He 
sat upon the stone, I think, in token of the complete- 
ness of Christ's triumph over death. Men, inspired 
of sin, and urged on by devilish foes, had rolled that 
stone to its place, sealing it with the impress of the 
Roman Government ; but now no human hands or no 
hands diabolic could roll that stone back where it was 
before. The angel sat upon it. Let anyone dare to 
imprison the living Christ, and the lightning of the 
angel's face would smite the miscreant to death. The 
stone that had shut Christ within that tomb had be- 
come a throne for a seraph. He sat upon it, thus 
symbolizing the fact that man's triumph and Satan's 
triumph had been turned into defeat. 

I am glad that Matthew did not leave out from his 
narrative of the resurrection this angel-topped stone. 
I have seen unsightly rocks made beautiful by the art 
of God — the same art that throws over the couch of 
the dying day robes of cloud colored with sunset, 



302 THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 

and, after the day is dead, lays it out in star-embroid- 
ered shroud, to wait for the resurrection at dawn. 
I have seen such rocks upholstered with moss, mak- 
ing them glorious and resplendent. So here does 
God adorn this rock of death with angel Jimbs and 
angel wings and angel face. In the presence of 
Christ's signal victory over the grave, death is spoiled 
of its terror for the Christian soul. Upon the door 
of every Christian tomb an angel is seated. Who 
fears death? 

In John Bunyan's matchless allegory, as the pil- 
grim to the celestial city was entering the gate of the 
Christian life, he was quickly drawn in by him who 
kept the gate, lest he be wounded by the archers of 
Satan shooting their arrows from below. Thus would 
Death like to maim and kill those who start heaven- 
ward through the gateway of the grave. But an 
angel stands there on guard. Bless God for the ser- 
aph that sat upon the rolled-away stone of Christ's 
sepulchre! "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, 
where is thy victory ?" Those two questions are two 
great diamonds polished by the rhetorical hand of 
Paul the Christian lapidary for the crown of the be- 
liever's triumph through Christ over the tomb. The 
dying school teacher wore that crown when he said, 
"Boys, school is dismissed." It was time for him to 
close the shutters, lock the door, and go home. The 
dying minister wore that jeweled crown when he 
said, "I move into the light." Hugh McKail wore 
that shining crown when on the scaffold of martyr- 



THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 303 

dom he said, "Welcome death! Welcome glory!" 
My own aged mother, in her last moments on earth, 
wore that crown when she said, using the second 
stanza of a hymn I love to sing, the tune Warwick, 

"Up to the hills where Christ is gone 

To plead for all His saints, 
Presenting at His Father's throne 
Our songs and our complaints." 

I was reading that hymn to my congregation in 
Chester at the very moment she was reciting its sec- 
ond stanza, I not knowing that she was treading 
those radiant hills, a streamer of black crepe con- 
fronting me the next morning as I ascended the door- 
steps of the old homestead. Paul himself wore that 
lustrous crown when from the dungeon of his last 
imprisonment he penned the sentence, flinging it as 
a challenge into the very face of the destroyer, "I 
am now ready to be offered, and the time of my de- 
parture is at hand." Millions have worn it, among 
them some whose final words you can recall on thi» 
anniversary of Christ's resurrection. An angel sit- 
ting on the stone that was lifted from the Saviour's 
mausoleum of rock. An angel at every Christian 
grave. Aye! The Saviour Himself standing by, 
alive for evermore, and saying to those who enter 
death, trusting in Him, "I am the Resurrection and 
the Life." 

Let the women devoted to Christ bring yet more 



304 THE ANGEL UPON THE STONE 

flowers for the celebration of this mighty victory. 
Bank every pulpit with flowers. Let every organ 
roll its thunders. Let every choir voice the sweetest 
of anthems. Let every bell and all the chimes charge 
the air with their richest melodies. If nations deem 
it fitting to commemorate battles on land and water 
with gorgeous procession along the streets of metro- 
politan cities, with flags and bunting afloat under the 
skies, with wide and lofty arches for generals and 
admirals to pass under, with blaring trumpet in tenor 
notes and resounding cannon in deeper bass, with ora- 
torical eulogium, then surely is it more appropriate 
to set forth the result of this more momentous and 
more glorious conflict of Death and the Captain of 
our Salvation, Christ conquering. 



Heavenly Recognition 

And behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias 
talking with him. Matt. 17:3. 

While the flowers of Eastertide are \et abloom, 
I thought that I would go into the garden of the 
Scriptures and bring you more flowers. Having dis- 
cussed the doctrine of the Resurrection, it is appro- 
priate now to speak upon a kindred theme, that of 
Future Recognition. 

"Shall we know each other in heaven?" That 
question is often asked. It is not a query born of 
idle curiosity. There is a throbbing heart in it. There 
are tears in it. There is earnestness in it. Those 
whose lips frame it are anxious to have it solved. 
As life moves on, as the passing years empty their 
treasures at our feet, as dear ones begin through 
sickness to halt along the journey, and as often we 
are called upon to close the eyes whose light has 
faded out, we naturally wonder if death is a spoiler 
of features here familiar. Yet why should we so 
wonder? We might dismiss the thought as it was 
once dismissed by John Evans, a minister of Scot- 
land. His wife came one day into his study and 
asked him if they should know each other in the 
coming life. He turned to her and said, "My dear, 
do you suppose that we shall be greater dunces there 
20 



300 HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 

than here?" He treated all doubt upon the subject 
as an absurdity. 

I. But let us glance at some of the proofs of the 
subject. There are some shadows upon the theme, 
but those shadows are silvered. There are stars in 
the sky. 

Walking one summer's day along the graveled 
paths of a suburban cemetery, I everywhere saw the 
evidences of Christian faith in the grand, thrilling 
and comforting doctrine of the Resurrection. All 
through that city of the dead was carved the ex- 
pression of such faith. Yonder rose a tall shaft of 
snowy whiteness towards heaven's blue. Beyond 
were statues clothed with grace and symmetry. 
Every mound was marked with stones of beauty. 
All these were adorned with some sparkling gem 
from the casket of poetry or with some brilliant 
from the jewel-case of the Scriptures. I saw these 
inscriptions: "O death, where is thy sting?" "Asleep 
in Jesus, blessed sleep." "Thy brother shall rise 
again." What boldness in such inscriptions ! Within 
the very precincts of the monster who for thousands 
of years had gorged himself upon human flesh, men, 
who were themselves waiting to feel that monster's 
hurtful blow, had dared to lift up a chiseled defiance. 
Upon the very door of the monster's grim palace 
they had bravely traced a prophecy of the monsters 
downfall. To the skeptic this would seem like a 
felon painting pictures upon the scaffold from which 
he was about to swing in agony, or like a madman 



HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 307 

twisting the straw of his couch into an imaginary 
crown, fancying himself a king. Nothing less than 
a clear, clean-cut, unmistakable revelation from God 
could have awakened such faith. Nothing less than 
a ray of glory from God's throne could have kindled 
such faith. Nothing less than a quickening of the 
eye through the power of God could have given such 
faith to the vision of men. 

But what would be the doctrine of the Resurrec- 
tion without that kindred doctrine, Recognition in 
Heaven ? A father is dying. His family and friends 
stand weeping around the bedside. All are Chris- 
tians. What mollifies the pain of that parting ? Is it the 
thought that the clay from which the spirit is about 
to depart shall survive the destruction of the grave 
and at the call of the last trump reorganize, coming 
forth then into immortality ? Oh, no ! There is an- 
other thought. It is that of reunion. The Resurrec- 
tion and Future Recognition are two doctrines bound 
together, as were the twins of Siam, by a tie that 
makes them inseparable. 

II. I further remark, that if there is to be no fu- 
ture recognition, then we must believe that death de- 
stroys the memory That would make death an anni- 
hilation. But we know that the memory is not de- 
stroyed. Said Abraham to the rich man who lifted 
up his eyes in hell, tormented, and begging that Laz- 
arus be sent to him with a drop of water to cool his 
burning tongue, "Son, remember that thou in thy 
lifetime didst receive thy good things, and likewise 



308 HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 

Lazarus evil things, but now he is comforted and 
thou art tormented." If the rich man had lost all 
recollection of the past when he died, it was absurd 
for Abraham to call his attention to that past; and 
Christ, Who relates the parable — I say it reverently 
— practiced a deception. What meaning could there 
have been to that man suffering the pangs of the 
damned in the words, "Son, remember," if he had no 
memory? He did remember, for he recognized the 
beggar who had sat all covered with sores at his 
princely gateway and ate the crumbs that had fallen 
from his luxurious table. If, therefore, the lost re- 
member, the conclusion, is irresistible that the saved 
also remember. Is hell to outdo heaven ? 

III. I go a step further than this, and positively 
declare that those in the spirit state of heaven do re- 
tain the power of recollection. What is yonder pro- 
cession sweeping grandly on to the throne of God? 
How the palms wave! Behold the shining crowns 
upon the brow ! Listen to the song that bursts from 
the lips of ten thousand times ten thousand and thou- 
sands of thousands. What are they singing? It is 
the wonderful theme of the Redemption— the ora- 
torio of the ages. But how can they sing that song, 
if they do not remember? When the saved soul en- 
ters heaven must it be told over again the story of 
the manger and the Cross? The question is foolish. 
There can be no doubt that we shall have the faculty 
of memory in heaven. That being true, it neces- 
sarily follows that we shall be able to recognize those 



HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 309 

with whom we here parted — our friends and the 
dear ones who once sat at our firesides with us in 
loving companionship and made music in our homes. 

"But," says an objector, "the body changes, we 
are told, every seven years. Suppose now that an ac- 
quaintance at the age of twenty should go into an- 
other part of the world, remaining there until he 
died, dying at the age of seventy years, you never 
seeing him again or looking upon his photograph, 
how would you recognize that acquaintance in 
heaven? He left you while standing upon the thres- 
hold of manhood ; he died with wrinkles on brow and 
cheek and with silvered locks falling towards his 
shoulders. His features would be so altered that 
you would not know him." 

Well, T reply, taking that question into the spiritual 
state that immediately succeeds death and into the 
resurrection state, it is not essential that mere fea- 
tures should be recognized. How do we recognize 
each other here? Is it only by the color of the hair, 
or the hue of the eyes, or the shape of the head ? By 
no means. We all have our own individuality, our 
own characteristics, our own disposition. By these 
we are known among our fellow men. Just as an 
author has his own style of writing or an orator his 
own style of speaking, so that reading their produc- 
tions we know from whose brain they sprung, so 
do we recognize our friends and relatives by what 
is peculiar to them and no one else. The soul is the 
real man or woman; it has features of its own to 



3 io HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 

make it distinguishable. Even if the body should be 
left to perish in the grave, there being no resurrec- 
tion, it is not at all likely that we should go through 
eternity unknown to each other. What a dreary wil- 
derness of endless monotony eternity would be ! As 
to the resurrection body, while it will be essentially 
the body we now inhabit, it is to be a spiritual body, 
an immortal body. Going down into death with the 
infirmities of age upon it, in the resurrection it will 
come up renewed, made over again, but with nothing 
of identity lost. We have a strong hint of this in the 
resurrection of Christ. His body had undergone a 
change, but His disciples recognized Him. 

These arguments all bring us back to the question 
of the Scotch minister with which we started, that 
question denying that the passage from this present 
life into future life robs us of intelligence. Why, 
this life is but the preparatory department of the life 
to come. Here we are in training for higher branches 
of learning. There we shall go to college. The 
memory that we now cultivate shall there blossom 
with quickened power. If we are not dunces here, 
it is not likely that we shall wear a dunce cap in that 
university for which we are now making ourselves 
ready. This world is but the dawn of the world to 
come. Beyond is sunrise. There shall be no night 
there. 

IV. I remark, again, that there shall be future rec- 
ognition because the life of heaven is described as 
one of happiness. How could it be that if we should 



HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 311 

not know anyone in it? Have you never stood in a 
crowd of people in which every man and woman and 
child was a stranger and experienced a feeling of 
loneliness ? Suppose now a soul should enter heaven 
and be incapable of recognizing any of those who had 
preceded him ? He walks the golden streets, admires 
the architecture along those streets, looks upon the 
flashing river of crystal, and listens to the music of 
angelic orchestras and choirs. But presently the 
novelty of his new surroundings wears off, and 
brushing against multitudes of celestial inhabitants, 
and finding them all strangers, he grows homesick, 
wishing himself back on earth. He could not be 
happy in a place like that. Such a heaven would be 
hell. 

"But," says someone, "he might form acquaint- 
ances there." Yes, I answer, but meeting those ac- 
quaintances again, how would he be able to recog- 
nize them? If he could not know those who had 
gone before him into the heavenly world, father, or 
mother, or children, what certainty would there be 
that after taking leave of those to whom he had been 
introduced in heaven, he should know those new ac- 
quaintances at a second meeting? There would be 
none at all. The idiocy with which he began his 
heavenly life would continue. He would be a fool 
forever. You see into what absurd absurdities a 
denial of this doctrine leads. From such a heaven 
may you and I be delivered! What a nebulous 
heaven it would be! Every instinct of the soul is 



3 i2 HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 

against such a heaven. Rather let me dream of it 
than realize it. A denial of future recognition with- 
ers every flower of hope, and reaching up, ex- 
tinguishes every star, bringing on a night that piles 
shadows into an impenetrable wall of gloom. 

V. Again, I remark, that the Scriptures distinctly 
tell us there is future recognition. Where? No- 
where in so many words. This is a doctrine that is 
taught by implication, it being taken for granted that 
the common sense of mankind would lead to an ac- 
ceptance of it without any questioning. David evi- 
dently believed in it. Death had gone into his palace. 
No medical skill could keep back the destroyer. 
Caring nothing for splendid surroundings, or courtly 
attendance, or the royal blood flowing through the 
veins of a sick child in that abode, Death placed his 
skeleton foot on the stairway leading to the chamber 
of illness, and with his bony finger touched the heart 
of the princely boy, bidding that heart cease its 
strokes. The crimson tide halted in the arteries. The 
eyes lost their lustre. The brow became white. 
Feeling the wrist, the physician announced the flight 
of the soul. Dead! Said the sorrowing father, "I 
cannot bring him back again, but I shall go to him." 
But what comfort would there have been in that, if 
David did not believe that he would be able to recog- 
nize his child in the other world? 

What is the meaning of the statements made in 
reference to the ancient saints when it is said, speak- 
ing of their death, that they were gathered to their 



HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 313 

people? Is it simply that they went into the grave 
with their ancestors? I think that it also means re- 
union with those who had gone before them. Were 
they unable to recognize those with whom they were 
reunited? 

But fn the New Testament we find the fact of fu- 
ture recognition still more vividly implied. Here a 
stronger light falls upon the subject. Some of the 
shadows are lifting. What does Christ mean when 
He speaks of the gathering of the Gentiles into the 
kingdom of heaven, throngs coming from every 
quarter of the compass, and in that kingdom sitting 
down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob? If those 
multitudes are to recognize the patriarchs of past 
days, never having seen them, shall not we be able 
to recognize those whom we knew on earth? Take 
again the case of the rich man in the flames of per- 
dition. Did he not know Abraham whom he had 
never met? Did death destroy the identity of Laz- 
arus? What do these things mean, if they do not 
take for granted an acceptance of future recognition ? 

In the narrative around the text Christ goes up 
into a mountain, taking three of His disciples with 
Him. Suddenly a supernatural radiance bursts upon 
the vision of those three favored disciples. Christ is 
transfigured before them, His inward divinity be- 
coming outwardly visible. With Him are Moses and 
Elijah, and wrapped about with heavenly splendor. 
Those disciples recognize both the law-giver and 
the prophet. What does this teach us? Why, if 



314 HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 

those men of earth could identify Moses and Elijah, 
who for centuries had been in the presence of God, 
and having never seen them before, can it be even 
thought that yonder, with the dust of this world 
cleared from the vision, you and I shall not be able 
to distinguish the features of those who were here 
with us in circle of friendship and within our homes ? 

What did Christ mean when He told those weep- 
ing sisters of Bethany that their brother should rise 
again? Death did not change the identity of Laz- 
arus. This was a picture of the future. The reun- 
ion of that Bethany home was typical of the reunion 
of heaven. "Your brother shall rise again." Not a 
stranger unknown to you, having no memory of the 
past, out of sympathy with the present, unassociated 
with all that is to come; but a thorough man, your 
very brother. So might the words of Christ be para- 
phrased. 

Further, what did Paul mean when he spoke of his 
Thessalonian converts as his glory and joy in the 
presence of Christ? How could Paul expect that, if 
he was not to know those converts in the other world ? 
It is said that there shall be some Christian saints 
who shall never see death. When the Christ shall 
come the second time they shall be alive. At the 
sounding of the final trump, that angelic music-blast 
to wake the slumbering dead of earth and sea, those 
living saints are to be caught up in the air to meet the 
Lord. Standing one moment side by side, and know- 
ing each other, shall they not the next moment, while 



HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 3*5 

passing upward and having reached the heights 
above, continue the acquaintance? To ask such a 
question is to answer it. 

Away with all fog from this subject! While we 
may not be able to peer through the shadows that 
invest the future state, we need not be in the least 
doubt about knowing each other in the life to come. 
Why should there ever have been any doubt in re- 
gard to the matter? I say to those who cavil at the 
fact what Diogenes said to Alexander as he stopped 
one day before the tub in which the surly philoso- 
pher made his home, "Get out of my sunshine !" If 
there is no such thing as future recognition, then the 
Mt. Auburns and Greenwoods and Laurel Hills of 
earth are naught but masked horrors, their graceful 
walks, their gleaming statuary, their noble trees, their 
flashing lakes, their wealth of emerald sward and 
rainbow-tinted flowers only the sarcastic smile of 
Death. What is resurrection without recognition? 

Said Joseph Cook, speaking of the heresy of a 
probation beyond the grave, "Give me no guess for 
my dying pillow." So when we stand or kneel at 
the bedside of dear ones passing away, or when we 
come to lie down ourselves in final sickness, what we 
want in that hour of falling shadow is not the added 
darkness of a theory, but the unmistakable illumina- 
tion of certainty. Therefore, when you ask me, as a 
minister of God, if we shall know each other in 
heaven, my answer is that the Bible flashes upon your 
query the light of a glorious affirmative. That Book 



316 HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 

takes it for granted that the intelligence of earth 
shall not be blasted by death. 

Traveling once down the Delaware River, we 
started in gloom. That gloom was hung from hori- 
zon to horizon, throwing a pall over land and water, 
But presently there came a break in the clouds, and 
those broken clouds began to wear the gilding of the 
sun. Then all the shadows retreated. The heavens 
were transfigured. The river rolled on like molten 
silver, its flash irradiating all the miles ahead and all 
the miles behind. When we reached the bay we were 
steaming on beneath a sky that would have thrilled 
a poet and thrown an artist into rapture. It was 
as if the gates of pearl had opened, letting pass 
through a whole regiment of fiery splendors with 
helmets and bayonets and swords of gold. 

In like manner, speeding down the river of death, 
shall the darkness flee and the light of reunion and 
recognition come as a sunburst to the Christian soul. 
At that supreme moment we shall have reached the 
port of the celestial city. The voyage over ; the sails 
furled ; the anchor dropped. That will be Jacob and 
Joseph in each other's arms, clasped in greeting! 
That will be the prodigal and his father embracing! 
That will be Home! 

Many dying souls have testified to the truth of fu- 
ture recognition. In the fading vision of earth they 
have seen loved ones long since departed and called 
them by name. Who doubts that the sight was real ? 
God let those loved ones go forth to accompany those 



HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 317 

left behind to the great house of many mansions. 
So shall we behold familiar faces shining over our 
last pillow and feel the touch of vanished hands. Or 
if God does not so grant, then in the awakening of 
heaven we shall certainly behold them and know 
them. Best of all, we shall see and know Him who 
redeemed us from the grave. Even will there be no 
need of an introduction to Him. We shall know Him 
instantly, as the waking flowers of the morn know the 
sun, and turn their faces to the glory of the king of 
day. Christ will be the centre of our attracted gaze, 
each of us exclaiming, as we meet His radiant glance, 
"My Lord and my God r 



A Glimpse of Heaven 

After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no 
man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, 
and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, 
clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; and 
cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which 
sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb. Rev. J : 9, 10. 

As when a cloud breaks in a stormy sky we catch 
a glimpse of the infinite blue above, so here through 
the persecution of the Apostle John we look into the 
glory of heaven. What wonderful things have is- 
sued from the trials of God's saints ! Joseph's prison 
the ante-room of a palace. Job's poverty and be- 
reavement and sickness the prelude to harmonies of 
faith, those harmonies yet vibrating in the air of 
earth, and which shall continue to echo until kissed 
by the music of the final trump. David's exile only 
the steps leading to a throne. Paul's tribulations the 
mallet and chisel that carved the grandest character 
ever produced by Christianity. John's Patmos of 
loneliness the tramping-ground of supernal splendors 
and sublimities. Let the shadows of night gather, 
if they will, over the lives of God's chosen ones ; they 
but unroll to view the hidden stars. Bless the Lord 
for grief and pain! 

But let us gaze at this picture of the text hung up 
within the gallery of the Apocalypse. Yonder is a 
throne. Shade your eyes, lest you be blinded by the 



A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 319 

splendor ! It is a throne that no Alexander or Caesar 
could have sat upon in all their greatness of earthly 
power — their thrones but ash-heaps in comparison. 
This is the throne that governs the universe. Around 
that throne eternal are three circles. Circle of the re- 
deemed of Christ. Circle of elders and beasts, those 
elders distinguished personalities, and those beasts 
symbolical living creatures. Circle of flaming an- 
gels. The redeemed of Christ the innermost circle 
of all. The supremest honors of heaven for those 
who have washed themselves in the blood of the 
Lamb. Fellow-Christians, "it doth not yet appear 
what we shall be." But if you and I could realize only 
a small part of the "far more exceeding and eternal 
weight of glory" that shall some glad day be ours, 
we should never again have an aching heart or a 
tear-moistened eye. 

I. In opening up the text, I ask you to notice the 
multitudes of the redeemed in heaven. These that 
John saw composing that inner circle around the 
throne of God were a great number that could not 
be calculated. That statement from the inspired pen 
of the seer of Patmos upsets all mathematical theories 
in reference to the population of the celestial city. 
London, Paris, Pekin, St. Petersburg, New York, 
Chicago and Philadelphia are the great cities of the 
world ; but their inhabitants can be computed. Every 
few years a census is made, and we know approxi- 
mately how many people are gathered in those large 
cities. It is estimated that the surface of the world 



320 A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 

is now pressed by over a billion pairs of human feet. 
But if all the throngs of earth were suddenly lifted 
into the golden streets of heaven, they would be lost 
in that metropolis of the universe. No mortal brain 
can figure even the number of the redeemed. John 
distinctly tells us that in the text. How then is it 
possible to enumerate heaven's population? The 
strongest imagination here folds its wings and refuses 
to fly. Away with human arithmetic! Heaven is a 
vast place beyond all earthly measurements. 

So does John's statement also upset all those nar- 
row notions that some entertain in reference to the 
number of persons saved by the sovereign grace of 
God. According to the ideas of some, heaven was 
built for a very small company. The teaching of the 
Bible is against all such circumscribed thought. What 
did Christ mean when He said, "In my Father's 
house are many mansions?" Why did He not indi- 
cate the exact number of those mansions, if heaven 
is but for a limited number that mortal brain can 
count? "Many mansions!" That phrase is sugges- 
tive of more than a few. What did John mean when 
he spoke of "ten thousand times ten thousand," af- 
terwards adding to that sublime multiplication an 
expression that shows the utter hopelessness of going 
any deeper into the sum, saying, "and thousands of 
thousands?" In the text he does not even make the 
attempt of reaching any result, simply stating, "I 
beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man 
could number." 



A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 321 

A child in the simplicity of his nature thinks that 
he can count the stars. He begins. How easy it is 
to count them ! The glow of the sunset is still in the 
sky. The stars twinkle forth one by one. But the 
darkness deepens. Then the constellations wheel to 
view. So thickly and so fast does the night scatter 
her gems abroad, that the child gives up his task. 
His puny arithmetic is not sufficient for the enumera- 
tion. He cries, "There are too many! I cannot 
count the stars!" "No," says an astronomer stand- 
ing by, "you cannot count the stars my child; but I 
can. All these that shine above us I have counted. 
Yet listen, child ; there are more stars yet that can be 
seen only through glass in a tube; and beyond the 
reach of that wonderful tube there are millions upon 
millions of stars. The stars cannot be counted." 

Like the child was the Apostle John in his enum- 
eration of the redeemed in heaven. Then he became 
as the astronomer. How useless it was to continue 
the count ! "A great multitude, which no man could 
number!" Even the telescope of inspired vision 
fails. Only God knows how many of the saved there 
are. But John's statement gives us a heaven that is 
as far removed from being a small locality as is a 
city like London in comparison with an Indian vil- 
lage. 

What a thrilling thought it is that there shall finally 

be unnumbered throngs of the redeemed ! The grace 

of God is not to be frustrated by the machinations of 

Satan. In the last census of heaven, **fter the Cross 

21 



$22 A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 

of Jesus Christ shall have exerted its magnetic power 
to the full, I believe that hell in comparison with 
heaven will occupy but the same relative space as that 
of a prison in the midst of a large community of law- 
abiding citizens. More human souls saved than 
damned. That circle of salvation around the throne 
of God stupendous beyond present thought. "A 
great multitude, which no man could number." 
Praise the Lord ! The all-important question is, Will 
you and I be among them ? 

II. I ask you to notice the varied nationalities of 
the redeemed in heaven. Listen to the majestic roll 
of John's language! "Of all nations, and kindreds, 
and people and tongues/' That explains what is 
meant a little farther on in this magnificent Book of 
Revelation by the statement that the city celestial has 
twelve gates — a trinity of gates facing each point of 
the compass. "On the east three gates ; on the north 
three gates; on the south three gates; and on the 
west three gates." Those numerous gates are for the 
entrance of the representatives of all mankind, 
whether born in Asia, or Europe, or Africa, or 
America. "All nations !" That there may be no 
possible mistake as to the world-wide reach of the 
Gospel of Jesus Christ, John adds, "and kindreds." 
That not being sufficient, he adds again, "and peo- 
ple." To still further emphasize his thought, he 
adds once more, "and tongues." That leaves no part 
of the earth out of the blessing of the Cross. 

John's language here is not tautological, simply a 



A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 323 

repetition of his thought. I am glad that he ex- 
pressed the matter as he did. Had he only said "all 
nations," it might have been meant that only those 
nations that were in existence at the time John was 
writing would be represented in redemption. But 
when he piles word on word, saying, "All nations, 
and kindreds, and people, and tongues," there can be 
no doubt whatever that he intended to convey the 
idea of no portion of humanity being missed. No 
corner of the globe to be left unreaped by the scythe 
of the Gospel. The redeemed shall come up to the 
pearl-gates of heaven from every nationality to the 
end of the world. No race without its representa- 
tives — many of the white race, the red race, the yel- 
low race, the bronze race and the black race. No di- 
visions of mankind without its representatives — many 
of all people in heaven. No language without its 
representatives — many of all tongues in heaven. 
Those who object to such a democratic heaven, using 
that word in its original sense, with no smell of 
American politics upon it, will have to make a small 
heaven of their own. Tne Bible recognizes no dif- 
ference in mankind except that of character. The 
only aristocracy that has any weight with God is the 
aristocracy of kinship with Christ. The Cross of 
Jesus is a shelter for all who go to it in penitence and 
faith, whether they be kings or peasants, noblemen 
or plebeians, rich or poor, wise or ignorant, and what- 
ever be the color of their skin or the speech of their 
tongues. Heaven is the gathering-place of the re- 



324 A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 

deemed of all humanity in its complex and diverse 
elements of being as everywhere found on the sur- 
face of the globe. 

The privileges and blessing of the Gospel being 
for all mankind, is it not high time, down here in the 
twentieth century, that the Church should hasten the 
work of world-wide evangelization? It is often 
asked why the chariot wheels of the coming Lord 
tarry. I will tell you why they tarry. They are 
clogged in the mire of Christian indifference and 
stinginess. There is no use in praying, "Thy king- 
dom come," if we are not doing all we can to make it 
come. When the teamster in the fable prayed Her- 
cules to help him get his wagon out of the mud, the 
giant god answered. 'Tut your own shoulder to the 
wheel !" That was another way of saying that faith 
without works is dead. The gathering of multitudes 
of humanity into heaven, as here described by John, 
can only be when the whole Church of Christ realizes 
her obligation to take this world for her Lord — a 
conquest that knows nothing of geographical lines. 
Those who will not shaie in this glorious mission 
must stand aside for those who will. May the day 
speed on when the vision of the seer of Patmos shall 
solidify into fact! "All nations, and kindreds, ano 
people, and tongues." 

III. I ask you to notice the garments of the re- 
deemed in heaven. "Clothed with white robes." Why 
not the blue with which God frescoes the sky ? Why 
not the green with which God dresses the fields and 



A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 325 

valleys and hills? Why not the variegated tints of 
the woods in springtime and autumn? Why not the 
lustrousness of the rainbow with which God robes 
the black shoulders of the storm? Why not in the 
purple of kings and queers, that hue boriowed from 
the sunset that enwraps the departing day? I an- 
swer that white is all colors blended into one. The 
redeemed are all one in the union of redemption. No 
sectarianism in heaven. Methodist and Presbyterian 
side by side. Episcopalian and Baptist side by side. 
Congregationalist and Quaker side by side. Luth- 
eran and Roman Catholic side by side. John Calvin 
and John Wesley together, clasping hands. With 
them Arminius and Top lady and Whitefield. All 
metaphysical and theological and ecclesiastic differ- 
ences gone. All variations of thought and feeling in 
reference to the unessentials of creeds and philoso- 
phies and church governments left as bundles of old 
rags outside the gates of pearl. All one; all clothed 
in white robes. Enthusiasts may talk as they please 
about bringing together the various divisions of the 
Church on earth, but their dream will never be here 
realized. It will take heaven to accomplish that 
glorious result. While the different denominations 
are closer together now than ever before in fraternal 
fellowship, they still have their party walls. If I 
had the power to unite them I would not exercise that 
power. I might want them all to be Presbyterians! 
But going into the wardrobes of the King's palace 
above, we shall all come forth arrayed alike. The air 



326 A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 

of heaven will clear our vision, and we shall see face 
to face what we now see through a glass darkly. 
"Clothed with white robes." That color typical of 
earthly diversity merged into heavenly sameness. It 
is only when the colors of the spectrum are separated 
that they become distinct from each other. United, 
they form the resplendent light that kisses the world 
into a blush of beauty. What is grander than sun- 
shine? So shall the blended hue of the garments of 
the redeemed in heaven reflect the uncreated glory of 
God. "White robes." 

But I like John's inspired thought. He tells us 
that the garments of the redeemed in heaven have 
been made white in the blood of the Lamb. It may 
strike some as being an incongruous thought. How 
could a garment be maae white by washing it in 
blood. Whatever it comes in contact with blood 
will stain. Many a murderer has ascertained that 
fact, and to his everlast'iig sorrow, science demon- 
strating before a jury trying him in a court room that 
blood is itself an unimpeachable witness against such 
crime, the searching eye of the microscope and the 
fingers of chemical reagents proving that blood per- 
sists in remaining upon the clothes of him upon 
whom it has been spattered. I once saw the room in 
which General Mercer died, having been mortally 
wounded in the battle of Princeton, during the Revo- 
lution. The marks of his blood were yet on the floor, 
over a hundred years having passed away, repeated 
washing having failed to remove the marks. 



A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 327 

Well, I answer, Johns expression is figurative, 
the idea being not that the garments of the redeemed 
are literally made white by the blood of the Lamb, 
but that the blood of the Lamb had atoned for their 
sins, the robes of white they wear symbolical of the 
cleansing of their nature through the infinite sacri- 
fice of Calvary. Oh, what a wonderful solvent that 
blood is! It acts even upon scarlet sins, making 
them whiter than snow. That blood gave David a 
white robe by taking away the stains of sin from his 
heart. That blood robed the dying thief in white, 
that outlaw stepping from a gibbet to a throne in 
heaven. That blood clothed Paul in white, changing 
him from a cruel persecutor to an illustrious mission- 
ary of the Cross. Oh, the unnumbered throngs that 
have come under the power of that blood! If, my 
friend, you expect to reach heaven, your expectation 
is vain, unless you have been washed by that blood. 
White robes are only for those whose lives are white. 

Yes, John, I like your thought. Men may deride 
the Cross of Christ or seek to hew it down with the 
axe of infidelity; but here is a reference to it in the 
closing book of the Bible that confirms the truth 
of it in all the preceding books — a final witness cor- 
roborating the testimony of numerous witnesses. 
That Cross eternal. Human philosophy and human 
scorn cannot destroy it nor mar it. Christ was slain 
from the foundation of the world. All the white- 
robed throngs of the celestial city ascribe their re- 
demption to the efficacious blood of the Lamb. 



328 A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 

Throughout endless ages you and I shall stand in 
full view of the Cross of Christ. 

IV. I ask you to notice the triumphant gladness 
of the redeemed in heaven. "Palms in their hands." 
That was what the children of Israel carried in the 
Feast of Tabernacles. That was what the people car- 
ried at the entry of Christ into Jerusalem, supposing 
that He was going into the city to be crowned. That 
is what were given the victors in the athletic contests 
of the Grecians to carry. That is what were carried 
in the triumphal processions of Roman generals re- 
turned from successful war. The palms of the re- 
deemed in heaven indicating joy and victory. Oh, 
the blessedness of it ! Here we often sit under some 
weeping willow, our hearts torn of grief, the very 
soul crushed. How glad we shall be to exchange 
earthly sorrow for heavenly happiness! Read what 
John says farther on in the chapter! "They shall 
hunger no more, neither thirst any more; neither 
shall the sun light on tlr-m, nor any heat. For the 
Lamb, which is in the midst of the throne, shall feed 
them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of 
waters ; and God shall wioe away all tears from their 
eyes." That last clause could never be read by Rob- 
ert Burns, the poet, without the greatest emotion, it 
causing him to weep. All trials ended. All heart- 
aches gone. All shadows lifted. "Palms in their 
hands." The palm-tree, straight as a chiseled col- 
umn, lofty, royal in bearmg, an appropriate emblem 
of triumphant gladness. It was the long leaf that 



A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 329 

shoots out from this tree at the top which was borne 
by men in victorious celebrations — the crown of the 
tree. Those white-robed throngs holding palms in 
their hands look back over the earthly life, and re- 
member the rough roads they traveled, the burdens 
that chafed their shouldeis, the pangs that trod their 
nerves with feet of fire, and the open graves at which 
they stood. But now they are exultant in that inner 
circle before the throne. Hear the rustling of their 
palms ! "These are they which came out of great 
tribulation." John himself is now with that victor- 
ious multitude; and Patmos, bleak, rugged, lonely, 
sea-washed, is as though it had been naught but an 
angel-punctuated dream. 

V. I ask you to notice, as my last thought, the 
song of the redeemed in heaven. "And cried with a 
loud vice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth 
upon the throne, and unto the Lamb." What a mag- 
nificent song! I have sometimes found myself won- 
dering at the feebleness of earthly song in some 
church services. In many churches a paid quartet 
does all the singing. I !ike artistic music, but no 
hirelings can lock my lips. I have been in meetings 
where the songs rolled from every tongue in a vol- 
ume of praise that was thrilling. I have been in other 
meetings in which the songs were so thin as to be 
almost ethereal — starveling songs with no robustness 
of Christian experience in their muscles. They 
would come forth from the mouth as if frightened, 
and die into a mere whisper. I am fond of vigorous 



330 A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 

congregational singing, every heart responsive to the 
sentiment being expressed, whether led by choir or 
a precentor, and the metady shaking the very walls 
of the building. I believe that such is the way they 
sing in heaven. In fact, I know it. John here dis- 
tinctly says, "Cried with a loud voice." No wonder! 
What was the theme ? The Salvation of God and the 
Lamb. Under the spell of that mighty theme, they 
sang with a power that filled all heaven with echoes, 
some of those echoes, the vibration softened, falling 
upon John's ears on Patmos. 

There are some human larynxes so constructed 
that harmony is impossible to them. I always feel 
sorry for persons who cannot sing. But up there we 
shall all be able to sing. In that oratorio of redemp- 
tion, you and I, standing with the rest of the saved 
in the presence of our Father God and Him Who 
spilled His blood for our sins, shall have a musical 
part — a full soprano, a tuneful alto, a well-chorded 
tenor, or a rich, resounding bass — mingling our 
voices with those of ten thousand times ten thousand, 
and thousands of thousands, in grand, thrilling, emo- 
tional doxologies. 

I have read of a legend which says that when per- 
sons entered the Temple of Diana they were blinded 
by the brilliancy of the room, the flashing gold and 
the sparkling jewels in that room too much for the 
vision. The janitor of that room always said to 
strangers visiting it for the first time, "Take heed to 
your eyes!" But what shall be the effect upon the 



A GLIMPSE OF HEAVEN 331 

hearing when the hallelujah of the redeemed in 
heaven shall break around the throne of God? A 
stupendous circle of song ringing around that throne. 
John hearing that song on Patmos, described it "as 
the voice of many waters." But had it come upon 
his earthly sense in all its volume of sound, it would 
have overpowered his auditory nerves, paralyzing 
them. God grant that we may all some day help to 
roll that doxology through the air of heaven ! 



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